MUarl 

 
 CHARLES BIANCONI 
 
 A BIOGRAPHY 
 
 17861875 
 
 BY HIS DAUGHTER 
 
 MRS. MORGAN JOHN O'CONNELL 
 
 
 LONDON 
 CHAPMAN AND HALL, 193, PICCADILLY 
 
 1878
 
 LONDOJf : 
 
 FEINTED BY VfETUK AND CO., LIMITED, 
 CITY ROAD.
 
 PEEFACE. 
 
 THIS book was written at my father's bidding ; but for 
 his commands I should not have undertaken the task, 
 for which I am hardly fitted. He was proud of his 
 hard-won success in life ; he was thankful to God for 
 having blessed his endeavours. He was fond of the 
 people among whom his lot was cast, and with whom 
 he had become one in heart and in spirit. His name is 
 a household word in Ireland, and I think it is enough 
 known in England for some to feel curious as to what 
 manner of man he was, how he strove and prospered 
 and grew rich in the country of his adoption. To 
 show this truthfully has been my main endeavour. I 
 have tried neither to hide his faults nor to exaggerate 
 his virtues. If I have succeeded in giving a faithful 
 picture of what my father w r as, my object will have been 
 gained. 
 
 Save where the text will show the interposition of 
 another hand, I have worked out and written all this
 
 VI PREFACE. 
 
 book myself. I had, indeed, written very much more, 
 but which my friend who revised my MS. has done well 
 to cut out. But there are other shortcomings due to 
 my sex and inexperience, which even his pruning-knife 
 could not touch, and for these I would ask the reader's 
 indulgence. 
 
 The drawings have been done by my old friend, Mr. 
 M. Angelo Hayes, and Mr. Hayes has also written for 
 me a long narrative which forms the whole of the fifth 
 chapter. I hope he will allow me to express my thanks 
 to him for the very kind way in which he has assisted 
 me in bringing out this life of my father. 
 
 October, 1877.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAP. PAOB 
 
 I. AUTOBIOGRAPHY 1 
 
 II. Miss BOURKE'S STORY 23 
 
 III. THE CORNER SHOP 30 
 
 IV. "THE BIANS" . ,\ . . . . . 45 
 V. MR. HAYES' NARRATIVE 106 
 
 VI. THE BIAN WORTHIES .129 
 
 VII. SHUTS SHOP AND MARRIES 149 
 
 VIII. MAYOR OF CLONMEL' 167 
 
 IX. THE NATIONAL BANK, AND THB HELPING HAND . . 198 
 
 X. ELECTIONEERING 214 
 
 XI. LONGFIELD 241 
 
 XII. LONGFIELD DEALINGS WITH CHURCH AND STATE . 270 
 
 XIII. PERSONAL EECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER . . 286
 
 CHARLES BIANCOKL 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 
 
 CHARLES BIANCONI, the second son of Pietro Bianconi 
 and Maria Caterina Mazza, was born on the 24th Sep- 
 tember, 1786, at Tregolo, a village in the Lombard 
 Highlands of Brianza, some eight or ten miles from 
 Como. In the neighbouring village of Caglio there 
 still stands the old family house, once known as the 
 Casa Bianconi ; but Pietro, who was himself a younger 
 son, never lived there. He married early in life, and 
 settled down on his own land at Tregolo, where he 
 lived on the proceeds of a silk-mill, farming his own little 
 property, and acting as land agent to the great Bonan- 
 cina family, whose estates nearly surrounded the village. 
 In those days small silk-mills were commonly to be 
 found upon every Lombard farm ; they have since 
 been replaced by larger holdings, and by factories. It 
 used to be my father's delight when he was a child to 
 
 B
 
 2 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 watch the working of the wheel of the silk-mill. The 
 wheel was turned by a man walking round it inside 
 the mill. Of course, in describing it to us at home, 
 he imagined it to have been much larger than it really 
 was, and this delusion he always affectionately che- 
 rished. The roof under which my father was born 
 and passed his earliest years has since been pulled 
 down, and two small houses with high narrow windows 
 have been erected in its place. Many years afterwards, 
 when he had become a rich man in Ireland, he was 
 perplexed by being told that he had inherited a small 
 patch of land at Tregolo, the land having been equally 
 divided among my grandfather's children. He left it 
 afterwards to the orphan daughters of a younger 
 brother. 
 
 My father had three brothers, who all lived to be 
 old men. He corresponded with them occasionally, 
 but he never knew them with brotherly friendship. 
 He was very fond of his only sister, Barbara. When 
 I saw her many years ago she was very like my 
 father, though handsomer. She was a fresh-coloured, 
 genial-looking old lady, with the same bright eyes as 
 my father, and the same full and well-formed lips. 
 Her grandson tells me that when she was young she 
 was so fair and so winsome, that she was called " la 
 bella bionda della Brianza." 
 
 My grandmother Mazza came of a prosperous family 
 from Monza ; one of the Mazzas had endowed a hospital. 
 My grandmother had brothers who rose to posts of 
 honour in the Church, and of these, the Rev. Dr. Giosue
 
 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 3 
 
 Mazza, Provost of Asso a place not far from Caglio 
 adopted my father, and my father remained under this 
 good man's protection until he was sent off to make his 
 own way in the world. 
 
 My great-uncle, Giosue Mazza, was a man of con- 
 siderable culture and great kindness of heart. I am 
 sorry to say that, though my father shared his cheer- 
 ful and sociable temperament, he had none of the 
 worthy doctor's love of learning. Charles Bianconi 
 was always fond of listening to the conversation of 
 intelligent men. He liked well enough to have strik- 
 ing passages of biographies or of political works read 
 to him, but he used to make it his boast that he never 
 read anything but what was inserted upon a way-bill, 
 as the documents were called which were sent out daily 
 with his cars. 
 
 Many years ago, at the request of Mr. Thomas 
 Drummond, the Irish Secretary, my father began to 
 write his biography. He never got on very far with 
 it ; indeed, it does not go beyond the days of his boy- 
 hood. He conceived the best plan for getting this 
 autobiography written was that he should lie in bed 
 and dictate it to an amanuensis. Accordingly he lay 
 in bed for three days and dictated. I will give some 
 extracts from it ; but more than that the reader would 
 hardly thank me for. My father regarded the work 
 with mingled feelings of admiration and diffidence, 
 and it will behove me best to adopt the side of caution. 
 
 After saying that he was brought up by his uncle, 
 the Rev. Giosue Mazza, Provost of Asso, and by his
 
 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 grandmother, who was living with this son of hers 
 in the Casa Bianconi at Caglio, he goes on : 
 
 " Soon after my removal to Asso I was sent to the 
 " school of the Rev. Abbe Radicali. I cannot at present 
 " remember the name of the town where it was situated, 
 " but I know it was the school where my father and 
 " uncle had been educated. The abbe was a great 
 " favourite of theirs, and was reputed to have made 
 
 " several good scholars While I remained at 
 
 " this school I was not merely the greatest dunce, but 
 " the boldest boy in the place. It was the abbe's prac- 
 " tice always to ring the dormitory bell from his bed- 
 " room, and then proceed to church, where we joined 
 " him for morning prayers as soon as we were dressed. 
 " One of the ' good boys ' had once complained of me 
 e: seriously to him, and to be revenged I stole this good 
 " boy's stockings, and stuffed the dormitory bell with 
 " them, which naturally prevented its ringing as 
 " usual. I anxiously waited the result of the discovery 
 " of the stockings, and expected every moment to see 
 " the tables turned on my antagonist ; but to my great 
 " mortification, when the old gentleman saw whose 
 " name was on the stockings, he turned on his heel, 
 " and we never heard any more about it. I frequently 
 " remonstrated about my situation at this school, but 
 " no attention was paid to my complaints. I can now 
 " honestly say that the advantages I got there were very 
 " small; .... 
 
 " I was at this time, in 1802 about fifteen or sixteen 
 " years old, a dunce, and a very wild boy ; yet I am
 
 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 5 
 
 " sure I had the credit for being much worse than I 
 " really was. I cannot say whether it was my ill- 
 " repute or the conscription that induced my father to 
 " send me abroad to sow my wild oats. I was, at any 
 " rate, bound to Andrea Faroni, who was to bring me 
 " to England. If I did not like to become a dealer in 
 " prints, barometers, and spy-glasses, at the expiration 
 " of eighteen months I was to be placed under the 
 " care of the late Mr. Paolo Colnaghi, who was to make 
 " new arrangements with my father. Faroni received 
 " a large sum for my maintenance, but he saved my 
 " father and Mr. Colnaghi all further trouble about 
 " me, for, instead of taking me to London, he brought 
 " me over to Ireland. This man had three other boys 
 " under his charge besides myself. One was Giuseppe 
 " Castelli, a son of the innkeeper in a town near Asso ; 
 " the second was Girolamo Camagni, the son of a 
 " master tailor at Como : the third was Giuseppe 
 " Bibaldi, a plain, good lad, a year or two older than 
 " myself, and the son of a honest flax-dealer. My 
 " father had a great regard for old Hibaldi, and pre- 
 " vailed on him to bind his son to Faroni. This boy 
 " was to have been a kind of brains-carrier for me, 
 " being so much steadier than I was. As a reward for 
 " looking after me, he was to share all my advantages 
 " at the expiration of an eighteen months' apprentice- 
 
 " ship 
 
 " On the eve of my departure, my uncle, the Rev. 
 " Dr. Mazza, gave an entertainment, not at his new 
 " living in the mountains, but at the inn in Como,
 
 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " where we boys were to meet our new taskmaster. 
 " Up to this time I had been much elated at the 
 " prospect of escaping from school and of seeing the 
 " world, but when I saw my poor mother faint at the 
 " festive board I began to realise that I was entering 
 " upon something very serious. During the few days 
 " that I had spent at my father's house she had tried 
 " to call my attention to my future life ; but now, 
 " surrounded as I was by so many people, some whose 
 " faces were new to me, and others old friends of my 
 " father's, who stuffed my purse with louis d'or, I 
 " became so excited, that no sooner was I separated 
 " from my mother than I almost entirely forgot 
 " her." 
 
 Andrea Faroni and the four boys then started for 
 England, going on foot over the Alps into Switzerland. 
 My father has given in his autobiography some of his 
 recollections of the early part of this journey, but they 
 need not be recorded here. There was one point, 
 however, that interested him, which I will mention. 
 One Sunday, morning they went to hear mass at the 
 parish church, and, much to his surprise, Lutherans 
 and Catholics officiated in turns on the same day. 
 
 " How very unlike," my father says, "to the state of 
 " things in Ireland, where my friend the Protestant rector 
 " of Clonmel threatened violence to my other friend, 
 " the Catholic pastor, if he attempted, unauthorised, to 
 " read the prayers of his Church over a friend's new-made 
 " grave in the churchyard common to both creeds, but 
 " in possession of the State Church. I regret exceed-
 
 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 7 
 
 " inglj my inability to discern why men will make and 
 " enforce laws so contrary to the general interest, and 
 " as one would imagine so much at variance with the 
 " well-being of the children of our beloved and corn- 
 " mon Father 
 
 " We reached Dublin in the summer of 1802, and 
 " lodged in Temple Bar, near Essex Bridge. Our 
 " master at once set to work making small leaden 
 " frames cast from a stone mould by the aid of a huge 
 " fire." Faroni had brought with him from Italy a 
 great quantity of cheap pictures, the greater part of 
 which illustrated some sacred subject. His object was 
 to put these pictures into frames, and then sell them. 
 " In a few days he had made a great number of these 
 " frames. He mounted them in pairs, on sheets of 
 " paper which folded up like a book. Everything then 
 " was ready for what seemed to us to be a very singular 
 " operation. We were to sell the prints in a strange 
 " country, without knowing a word of the language. 
 " He further asked us to deposit our pocket-money in 
 " his hands, a request with which we dared not refuse 
 " to comply. He then turned us out into the streets, 
 " among people speaking an unknown language to us, 
 " to sell these little pictures. I shall never forget the 
 " ludicrous figure I cut in going into the street with 
 " a pair of these things in my hands, saying ' buy, buy,' 
 " to every person I met, and when questioned as to the 
 " price I was unable to reply except by counting on 
 " my fingers the number of pence I wanted. 
 
 " I soon learned a little English, and then I was sent
 
 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " off into the country every Monday morning with two 
 " pounds' worth of these pictures, and fourpence 
 " allowed me for pocket-money, on the understanding 
 " that I was expected home on the following Saturday 
 " evening. When we had quite beaten all the country 
 " round about Dublin, Camagni, the tailor's son, and 
 " I were ordered to Waterford and Wexford. This 
 " lad, who, as it seemed to me, was neither very moral 
 " nor very industrious, soon ran away, and Bibaldi was 
 " sent to replace him. At Waterford I found that 
 " the demand for my small prints was considerable. 
 " Besides the Scripture pieces, there were portraits of 
 " the Royal Family, of Bonaparte, and of his most 
 " distinguished generals. From Waterford I went to 
 " Passage, a village a few miles off, and there I was 
 " very much surprised at finding myself arrested, by 
 " the order of an over-loyal magistrate, for the treason- 
 " able act of selling Bonaparte's effigy. I was kept 
 " perishing all night in a guard-room, without fire or 
 " without bedclothes, but the next morning I was set 
 " at liberty. 
 
 " About this time my master began to make larger 
 " sized leaden frames for larger sized pictures, which 
 " we were to sell for a shilling the pair. This made us 
 " feel proud, and gave us a new interest in our work. 
 " As time went on, these pictures were succeeded by 
 " still better ones, with wooden frames, and this made 
 " me feel myself to be quite a person of consequence. 
 " Until then, ever since I had crossed the Alps, the spirit 
 " of my own existence seemed to have left me, and I
 
 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 9 
 
 " thought of nothing but implicit obedience to a person 
 " whom I considered as holding my being in his hands, 
 " and that beyond him I had no alternative. Though 
 " his office as regarded me was not an enviable one, he 
 " always treated me with courtesy. At the expiration 
 " of eighteen months, which was to have been the 
 " period of my exile, if I had so willed it, he declared 
 " himself ready to fulfil his engagement with my 
 " father, and take me back to him. My pride was so 
 " mortified that I declined his offer. He therefore 
 " gave me back my purse with its entire contents, about 
 " a hundred louis d'or, which seemed to me then to 
 " be a very great sum. 
 
 " I at once got a box made to contain large framed 
 " prints. *Lt was two feet long by one foot wide, and 
 " eighteen inches deep. This box I filled with an 
 " assortment of prints, from the largest to the smallest 
 " size. With this pack on my back, which weighed 
 " over a hundred pounds, I have frequently walked 
 " from twenty to thirty miles in the day. I was then 
 " seventeen years old, and I knew neither diseourage- 
 " ment nor fatigue, for I felt that I had set to work to 
 " become a great man. It was not long before I came 
 " to perceive the great differences between the pedler 
 " doomed to tramp on foot as I was, and his more for- 
 " tunate fellow who could post, or ride on horseback. 
 " These thoughts were hovering about in my mind, 
 " along with the fixed idea that had become a ruling 
 " passion with me, how to become somebody ; and 
 " this firm resolve enabled me to overcome the dis-
 
 10 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " couragement and discontent that tad previously op- 
 " pressed me. 
 
 " In the course of my rambles through the country, 
 " I often met with great attention from many respect- 
 " able families. Up to this time I had made it a rule 
 " to decline all friendly overtures. But when I started 
 " in business on my own account, I began to think 
 " seriously that I was not in my right position in society, 
 " and that as I then was I was incapable of putting 
 " myself right. These ideas embarrassed me much, as 
 " did the kindness of many of my customers, who 
 " recommended the ' curly-headed Italian boy ' to their 
 " friends as having the cheapest pictures and the 
 " greatest quantity of them. Among these friends I 
 " must not forget "William Cahill and Father Healy, 
 " afterwards the parish priest of Newport. Mr. Cahill 
 " at that time had a large trade as a brogue-maker, 
 " and he frequently bought his leather from Mr. Bald- 
 " win, a tanner at Cahir, in County Tipperary. On 
 " visiting Thurles, I found that Mr. Cahill had been 
 " making friends for me, which I was anxious to avoid, 
 " but on my next visit to Cahir I was obliged to yield 
 " to the hospitality of Mr. and Mrs. Baldwin, who 
 " afterwards became my very dear friends. I stayed 
 " with them frequently, and they treated me as one of 
 " their own children, except that they allowed me 
 " greater privileges." 
 
 I have often heard my father speak of these excel- 
 lent people, who were devout Catholics. There are no 
 Baldwins in Cahir now, but a close intimacy still exists
 
 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 11 
 
 between our family and Mr. John Baldwin Murphy, Q.C., 
 one of their descendants in the female line. He hap- 
 pened to mention, accidentally, that his mother-in-law, 
 Mrs. Morrogh, of Kilworth, remembered that when she 
 was a child she had bought little pictures out of my 
 father's pack. I wrote to her at once, and received 
 the following kind letter in reply : 
 
 " I regret I am not able to give you much aid in 
 " your work relative to your respected father's early 
 " life in County Tipperary. I only recollect thinking 
 " him a handsome, interesting youth when I was a 
 " child staying with my grandmother, Mrs. Keating, 
 " in Cahir. She, poor old lady, had a great respect 
 " for the ' little genteel foreigner,' as she used to call 
 " him, and when he would come laden with prints and 
 " pictures for sale, it was always a great pleasure to 
 " her to see his store, and she was sure to make him as 
 " comfortable as she could. And if he were not dis- 
 " posed to eat she would make him sit by her side, and 
 " would coax him to take something. In those days 
 " all parties were more social, and they mixed more 
 " together than they do now. Numbers of people used 
 " to meet at her house on Sundays after prayers at 
 " church and chapel in the town of Cahir. Lord 
 " GlengalPs band had orders to play at Mrs. Keating's 
 " door from two to four o'clock, a great attraction for 
 " friends to meet. Then if ' the little foreigner ' hap- 
 " pened to be in town, she would do her utmost to 
 *' show off his stock, and to encourage buyers." 
 
 Another family at whose house Charles Bianconi
 
 12 CHARLES BTANCONI. 
 
 was made kindly welcome was that of Mr. Lamphier, 
 of Parkstown, one of the sturdy old Protestant squires. 
 My father has often told me that when he was first 
 invited to dine there he refused, fearing that he might 
 have been sent into the kitchen, but Mr. Lamphier 
 dragged him into the dining-room, and set him down 
 among his family. 
 
 ''During these visits," he says, "treated as the 
 " favoured guest of such amiable and hospitable people, 
 " I frequently could have fancied myself at home in my 
 " father's house until the thought of my real position, 
 " that of a better-class pedler, would come before me. 
 " These kind attentions only served to give me an 
 " imperfect view of my solitary and forlorn state. 
 " Then I would recollect my poor mother, and all my 
 " dear friends from whom I was separated, and from 
 " whom I had parted with so little concern. I would 
 " sometimes resist the greatest luxury I could possibly 
 " enjoy, and lock myself up in my bedroom, and there 
 " cry bitterly. I could no longer submit to the picture 
 " box, though it had not become heavier than before. 
 " It was, indeed, nearly worn out, so I threw it away, 
 " and got a portfolio of unframed prints in its place, 
 " which, while its novelty lasted, did very well. How- 
 " ever, as I formed fresh acquaintances, and became 
 " more intimate in respectable houses, I felt more and 
 " more galled by my unnatural position. So I boldly 
 " resolved to throw away the portfolio, and retire again 
 " into obscurity. I gave up all my friends and acquaint- 
 " ances, and turned carver and gilder. I opened a
 
 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 13 
 
 " shop in Carrick-on-Suir in 1806, and I endeavoured 
 " to become a proficient in the trade. 
 
 " During my former visits to Carrick, I had made 
 " the acquaintance of two very extraordinary characters, 
 " Patrick Lynch, a celebrated schoolmaster, father of 
 " the late Councillor Lynch, Keeper of the Record 
 " Tower in Dublin, and John Stacy, a printer. 
 " Through Stacy I made the acquaintance of Francis 
 " White, father to my kind friend, Dr. Francis White, 
 " who was one of the most learned and accomplished 
 " men of his day. 
 
 " I supplied my Carrick shop with gold leaf from 
 " Waterford, going down in Tom Morrissy's boat to 
 " buy it. Carrick-on-Suir is twelve or thirteen miles 
 " from Waterford by land, but the windings of the 
 " river make it twenty-four by water. This boat was 
 " then the only public conveyance. The time of its 
 " departure had to depend upon the tide, and it took 
 " from four to five hours to make the journey. In 
 " after years I had five four-wheeled cars and one 
 " mail-coach, capable of carrying one hundred per- 
 " sons, running daily between these two places. 
 
 " Once when I went down to Waterford by the 
 " boat, on a terribly wet day, and got my feet 
 " thoroughly soaked by walking about the muddy 
 " streets, I had to travel back at night without being 
 " able to change my clothes. The result was a severe 
 " cold, which turned into an attack of pleurisy, that 
 " laid me up for two months. During all this time I 
 " was attended by Dr. Francis White, and he visited
 
 14 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " me daily until I had recovered. I was more than 
 " willing to share my small means with my kind pre- 
 " server, but when I asked him for his account he 
 " positively refused to accept a penny." 
 
 Dr. White seems to have been more than a physician 
 to my father. He was his companion and his friend. 
 In his old age my father loved to dwell on this time, 
 which was a turning-point in his life. From things 
 he often said, I fancy the fact of finding that a young 
 man, who was a gentleman and a scholar, should seek 
 his company, gave him the moral courage to attempt 
 to raise himself. He says in his autobiography : " In 
 " this instructive and delightful mode of life I began 
 " to be myself again. Fresh ideas, sounder and more 
 " reasonable notions, entered my mind, and I became 
 " more rational and happy. As soon, therefore, as I 
 " was well and out of my kind doctor's hands, I 
 " removed to Waterford. 
 
 " At Waterford I took comfortable private lodgings, 
 " and I issued cards showing that I was a carver and 
 " gilder of the first class. I made up for the want of 
 " knowledge in the manual details of my business by 
 " incessant industry. I frequently worked from six 
 " o'clock in the morning until two hours after mid- 
 " night, with the exception of two hours for dinner 
 " and recreation. These precious hours I often spent 
 " in the pleasant society of the late Right Reverend 
 " Dr. O'Finan, afterwards Bishop of Killala, then a 
 " professor in the "Waterford Catholic College. Another 
 " of my chosen associates was our common friend,
 
 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 15 
 
 " Father Thomas Murphy. He was one of the kindest 
 " men I ever met. The poor never were in want 
 " of clothes or money while he had them to give. 
 " When he died of a fever in 1817, caught during his 
 " attendance on the sick people, he only left threepence 
 " behind him in money. Yet he had a large allowance 
 " from his sister, had good church preferment, and 
 " was the President of St. John's College." 
 
 Through Mr. Cahill, the brogue-maker at Thurles, 
 my father made the acquaintance of Edward Rice, the 
 founder of the " Christian Brothers " in Ireland. By 
 a graceful mistake the " Brothers of Christian Schools " 
 became shortened into " Christian Brothers," by which 
 name the fraternity is always known in Ireland. 
 
 Edward Rice was truly a benefactor to his country. 
 He devoted his life and means to these schools years 
 before the National Schools were established. My 
 father says of him : " This pure-minded man owes his 
 " elevation to considerable affluence and to his perse- 
 " vering industry. He must be happy in the reflection 
 " that he had the courage to invest the whole of his 
 " means in the foundation of this invaluable institution 
 " that contributes so much to the improvement of his 
 " country. Feeling as I do the want of education my- 
 " self, I know how great a blessing a man confers when 
 " he instructs the ignorant 
 
 " At this time there lived in Waterford a bookseller 
 " and printer named John Bull, the most finished trades- 
 " man in his way that I ever met. He actually per- 
 " suaded me that books were not only the best things
 
 16 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " to buy, but that they were good also as an investment.* 
 " Among my purchases from him was Smith's ' Wealth 
 " of Nations.' I spent portions of six months in look- 
 " ing it over, and I only got half way through the first 
 " volume. I cannot now say whether it was my want 
 " of knowledge of the language or my ignorance of 
 " logic that hindered me from doing better. The 
 " things that struck me most were the division of 
 
 " labour and the value of time When my dear 
 
 " old friend Doctor Francis White died, his rare library 
 " was removed from Carrick to Waterford to be sold. 
 " I bought some of his books, among others Doctor 
 " Fell's edition of Saint Cyprian's Works. I was 
 " greatly struck by the following admirable passage, 
 " which occurs in the treatise on the Lord's Prayer : 
 " ' The words of a Son so dear cannot but be acceptable 
 " to a Father so indulgent/ Nothing, I thought, was 
 " better calculated to arouse and cheer an isolated poor 
 " fellow so far removed from the fostering care of his 
 " parents. Another of Doctor White's books that I 
 " purchased was * Sir Walter Raleigh's Remains.' The 
 " following passage struck me forcibly : ' Recollect,' 
 " he says to his son, ' in your will that your wife is the 
 " mother of your children and the partner of your life, 
 " but should she marry again, her new lover ought 
 " not to lie on the feathers plucked from your bones.' ' 
 While at Waterford my father received much kind- 
 ness and hospitality from Mr. and Mrs. Fleming, and I 
 
 * Does not this remind us of Holiere's " Vous etes orfevre, Monsieur 
 Josse"?
 
 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 17 
 
 have often heard him say how much he used to love to 
 go to their house and play about with their children. 
 Mr. Fleming was a goldsmith by trade, and he helped 
 my father materially in his business, besides the pleasure 
 that he afforded to him in his leisure hours. 
 
 " Having spent two years in Waterford, where I 
 " made myself more proficient in the mechanical part 
 " of my profession, and also improved my means, I 
 " went to Clonmel, and took a small shop in Dublin 
 " Street. From this I removed to the Corner House, 
 " opposite to the Main Guard, now No. 1, Johnson 
 " Street. I then wrote to my old friend Ribaldi, who 
 " was at that time a prosperous tradesman in London, 
 " and asked him to send me some mirrors. To enable 
 " me to pay the ten per cent, ad valorem duty on these 
 " goods, I got Messrs. Ryall Brothers, bankers in 
 " Clonmel, to accept my promissory note for 20 ; but 
 " as we had then no steamers, and the Liners were not 
 " so regular as they are now, my note became due 
 " before the goods arrived from London. I thought 
 " that the conduct of my bankers was most unkind in 
 " sending for the amount of my promissory note before 
 " I had made use of their money. When I went to 
 " remonstrate with them on the subject, they seemed as 
 " much astonished at my conduct as I had been at 
 " theirs. However, they held over my note, and 
 " allowed me to keep the cash ; and, notwithstanding 
 " the strange irregularity of my first transaction with 
 " them, they subsequently acted towards me with 
 " fatherly kindness. In those days I used occasionally
 
 18 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " to go down to Waterford to see my old friends there, 
 " and at Clonmel I became acquainted with Parson 
 " Carey, the Head Master of the Clonmel Endowed 
 " Grammar School. He was a man whose friendship I 
 " enjoyed for many years." 
 
 By this time my father's business was firmly esta- 
 blished, and he felt himself quite at home in Clonmel. 
 He was elected one of a Society for visiting the Sick 
 Poor, and by an annual payment of three guineas he 
 made himself a member of the House of Industry. 
 His name, Charles Bianconi, became metamorphosed 
 into Bryan Coony, Bryan of the Corner. It was 
 the fact of his shop being at the corner of the street 
 that gave rise to the play upon the words. The 
 Coonys were well-to-do farmers, and one old lady of the 
 family drove many miles to Clonmel and called on my 
 father to ascertain to what branch of the sept he be- 
 longed. She was rather disappointed that she could 
 not claim a relationship with so prosperous and well- 
 favoured a namesake. Later on, when the "Corner 
 Shop " was a thing of the past, my father was always 
 called "Bian." So that in his youth he lost the first two 
 and in his old age the last two syllables of his name. 
 
 " About this time the Government began to sub- 
 " sidise the allied armies of the Continent, and the 
 " heavy and pressing demands for bullion at once set 
 " in. My ' Corner Shop ' was an admirable site for 
 " buying the hoarded-up guineas of the peasantry, and 
 " I was commissioned by a highly respectable house in 
 " Dublin to buy up gold for them. Thus I found
 
 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 19 
 
 " myself engaged in a most responsible trade with 
 " inadequate means, and with a very limited know- 
 " ledge of the business. How shall I describe the 
 " conduct of my respected friends Messrs. Ryall, the 
 " bankers, who at this juncture enabled me to surmount 
 " the great money difficulty by giving me a most 
 " liberal accommodation ? Time and experience did the 
 " rest. Besides this new bullion traffic, which lasted 
 " for some years, and in which I was fortunately suc- 
 " cessful, I carried on the ordinary business of my 
 " shop. This was how I became so engrossed in my 
 " double business, that I neglected all my self-imposed 
 " charitable and municipal duties, leaving the sick poor 
 " at home and in the hospital to take care of them- 
 " selves. All my determinations and wishes to see my 
 " suffering fellow-pedestrians carried from town to town 
 " paled before this new and engrossing occupation." 
 
 In his autobiography Charles Bianconi has at dif- 
 ferent times expressed his sorrow at the fatigues that 
 the poor people had to undergo in performing their 
 journeys from one town to another on foot, and has 
 wondered whether some means could not be devised to 
 alleviate their sufferings. As has been said already, it 
 was doubtless the toils that he himself had borne that 
 made him think so much of the sorrows of others. 
 
 " During my former brief residence in Clonmel, some 
 " years before, I had become acquainted with John and 
 " James Corbet, two intelligent elderly men, and I now 
 " renewed my friendship with them. I felt a particular 
 " and almost a filial regard for them, and when I was a
 
 20 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " prosperous and well-to-do tradesman in Clonmel I 
 " loved to see them at my table. I derived extreme 
 " pleasure from hearing their reminiscences, extend- 
 " ing over the terrible times of the Eebellion of 1798 
 " and the atrocities that followed. One of their most 
 " stirring narratives was the execution of Father Sheely, 
 " judicially murdered in 1766 on the plea of having 
 " been accessory to the death of a man bribed to absent 
 " himself. The terrible doom that overtook Father 
 " Sheely's persecutors, death in hideous forms, suicide, 
 " madness, loss of land and station, was a favourite 
 " topic of conversation with the Corbets, and to me it 
 " was vividly interesting. All these narratives tended 
 " to increase my desire to see good and impartial laws 
 " duly administered among the people. This was the 
 " passion that animated Daniel O'Connell in his struggle, 
 " and was the mainspring of the great movement 
 " among the Catholics. One of the injustices of which 
 " the Corbets used to tell me was the unfair way in 
 " which the Catholics were taxed in Clonmel. Amongst 
 " others they related a practice then in existence. The 
 " Protestant shopkeepers, upon a certain day, used to 
 " go about the town levying a tax upon their Catholic 
 " neighbours who attempted to open shops within the 
 " town walls of Clonmel. They used to wring from 
 " each individual from two to four guineas, which 
 " they called ' Intrusion Money.' My informants 
 " specially praised an old Mrs. Ryan, dead now long 
 " since, who boldly refused to comply with their de- 
 " rnands. The tax-makers therefore seized her goods.
 
 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 21 
 
 " She afterwards recovered them at law, and her spirited 
 " conduct led to the abolition of this toll. We Catholics 
 " had at one time to pay a tax upon all bought mer- 
 " chandise, while our more favoured Protestant and 
 " Dissenting fellow-townsmen were made free of the 
 " place, and saved not only from a needless expenditure 
 " but from the galling contact with such a class as the 
 " toll-gatherers. Since these vexatious practices have 
 " been discontinued, it is hardly possible to describe 
 " the wonderful increase of business in the town, and 
 " the great extension of Clonmel itself. 
 
 " In the house numbered 112, Main Street was the 
 " Newsroom, which I joined. I was greatly struck 
 '" by the loud and consequential talk constantly going 
 '" on between a Mr. Jephson and a Sir Richard Jones, 
 " and two more of their set, whereas I and my fellow- 
 '" Papists were not allowed to speak above a whisper. 
 '" This I resolved not to submit to, for I could see no 
 " reason why, when I had paid my money in a public 
 " place, I should not share all equal rights. Others 
 " followed my example, and as we all, Protestants 
 " and Papists, indulged in equally noisy declamation, 
 " a stranger entering our newsroom would have been 
 " puzzled to say which party were the privileged 
 " administrators of the penal code." 
 
 Here Charles Bianconi tells at some length the well- 
 known story of the unjust flogging of a Protestant 
 gentleman, Mr. Barney Wright, for having on his person 
 a French letter which Mr. Barton, an ultra-loyal magis- 
 trate, was unable to translate. It is consoling to know
 
 22 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 that when milder times came Mr. Wright obtained 
 heavy damages. 
 
 This is the end of my father's autobiography. But 
 before going on further with the history of his life, it 
 will be well to put in a short chapter giving some of 
 the details of his early days, very kindly supplied to 
 me by Miss Julia Bourke, of Breners, the only person 
 now living who knew my father intimately seventy years 
 ago.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 MISS BOURKE'S RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 
 
 IN the early part of this century Miss Julia Bourke 
 and my father had been great friends. Her family had 
 once owned considerable estates, and since Cromwell's 
 time leased part of them from the ancestors of the 
 Earl of Bessborough. Miss Bourke lived to see the 
 old place of Breners pass totally away, but she never 
 lost the pluck, the pride, and the courtesy befitting 
 her long descent. My father used to tell us at home 
 that he had carried on a mild flirtation with her 
 for the last sixty years, and every Christmas he used 
 to make us all laugh by handing about at the break- 
 fast-table the cheery and sprightly letters he had 
 received from her. In July, 1875, I went to visit her 
 at Piltown, near Carrick-on-Suir, where she lived, with 
 the idea of learning from her some facts as to the early 
 days of my father's life in Ireland. Miss Bourke was 
 then eighty -five years old ; she was poor and very 
 nearly blind, but she received me kindly and bade me 
 welcome. I thought I saw that in spite of the marks 
 that old age and misfortune had left upon her face, she
 
 24 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 must, when young, have been pretty. She was small 
 in size, and had rather aquiline features. Her skin 
 was still clear and fresh-looking ; her eyes were bright 
 blue in colour, and they could still laugh, though 
 they could no longer see. She said that her memory 
 was failing her, but I suspect that was in things of 
 every -day occurrence, for sometimes, when quoting what 
 my father said, she would use the same words and the 
 same quaint expressions that he had been wont to make 
 use of. When she was young she must have been a 
 great mimic, for she now unconsciously imitated the 
 tones of my father's voice, and the foreign accent that 
 somewhat thickened his Tipperary speech. 
 
 At first I told her some news concerning her own 
 relations, for I knew some of her connections who were 
 getting on well in the world. Then I listened to her 
 not unnatural expressions of feeling at the unbroken 
 friendship lasting longer than many a lifetime 
 that had subsisted between her and my father. Thus, 
 by degrees, I got her into the vein of speaking freely 
 of old times. All the old life and fun returned to 
 her, and from half crying she got to laughing. Then 
 she began : 
 
 " I can see your father this very minute just as he 
 was when I first saw him at my Uncle Baldwin's house 
 in Cahir. He was so smart and full of life, and had 
 such bright brown eyes that looked through you, and 
 such thick black curls ! He came in with a portfolio 
 of prints under his arm, and we children all set at him 
 and rummaged his pretty things."
 
 MISS BOUEKE'S RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHEK. 25 
 
 " How old was he then, Miss Bourke?" I asked. 
 
 " He was a grown boy, but not quite a man ; he 
 may have been about sixteen, or a little more. I was 
 quite a little thing. He used to call me little Julia 
 and ' leettle dheevil ;' that was a pet name he had for 
 me, my dear." 
 
 The old lady thus excused the indecorous phrase, 
 which I knew quite as well as she did. My father 
 used to call me, his daughter, "little dheevil," when he 
 was in an extra good humour, even after I had been 
 some years married. 
 
 " Did you think him handsome ?" 
 
 "Well, he was very good-looking, but it was his 
 eyes that were so bright. My aunt called his attention 
 to me, but he looked at my cousin, and did not mind 
 me. 'Why are you looking so hard at Bridget?' 
 some one said. 'I am looking at her because I left a 
 little sister at home that was fair too, and was like 
 her, and would now be about her size.' ' : 
 
 Miss Bourke was speaking of the first time when she 
 saw my father. She used often to stay with her aunt, 
 Mrs. Baldwin, and he had strict orders from both Mr. 
 and Mrs. Baldwin whenever he came to Cahir to make 
 their house his home. Now, though a successful 
 tradesman, my father honestly admitted that he was 
 not a skilful craftsman. His hands were short and 
 rather stumpy. He had no talent for driving in 
 nails, or pruning trees, or playing upon any instrument. 
 By sheer force of will and hard work he contrived to 
 overcome this want so far as to do plain gilding fairly
 
 26 CHAELES BIAKCONI. 
 
 well, but as soon as he could afford it he employed 
 skilled women to do the finer work. Before he had 
 his regular shop, when it was possible, he would, in the 
 most polite manner, show the young girls how to gild, 
 and then coax them to help him. Miss Baldwin had 
 been an early pupil of his, and when he got his great 
 job, the gilding of a dreadful pseudo- Gothic erection 
 in Cahir Chapel, part tabernacle, part reredos, at which 
 I have gazed in virtuous horror, he availed himself of 
 her slender fingers for the fine parts of the work. Her 
 mother was too good a Christian to object to her 
 daughter's helping to adorn the house of the Lord. So 
 Charles Bianconi and Miss Baldwin worked together at 
 the gilding, and the children ran in and out, watched 
 and wondered, and did mischief after the manner of 
 their kind and country. 
 
 " Did you help him too, Miss Bourke ? " I asked. 
 
 " No, I did not, Mrs. O'Connell. I was too young 
 and too giddy. I used to run in and out, and peep 
 over his shoulder, and breathe on the gold, and he 
 would call out, ' Run away, you little dheevil,' and 
 hunt me out, and bolt the back door of the chapel. 
 My aunt used to send me this back way through the 
 garden and orchard to call them in to dinner, and 
 Charles and I had a private signal of our own. I 
 would snatch up a screeching hot potato, run down, 
 and then present it to him." 
 
 " Did you sing in the choir ? "Were you one of the 
 six young girls to whom he taught the Gregorian 
 chant?"
 
 MISS BOTJRKE'S RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 27 
 
 " I was not ; I was too young and too naughty. I 
 know I have heard him sing, but I don't remember his 
 voice, but I do remember how he used to say his 
 prayers. Every night in the year my poor father used 
 to have the rosary." 
 
 " What, ma'am ! Is it out of Lent ?" said I. 
 
 It is customary in most Catholic country-houses to 
 have this family prayer said only in Lent and in 
 Advent, and, if the people are very good, on Sunday 
 nights also. The rosary, I may perhaps as well say, 
 consists of short meditations on the principal events of 
 our Lord's life, with repetitions of " Paters," " Aves," 
 and " Glorias." These are counted by means of rosary 
 beads, and the devotion takes its name from being 
 offered " as a crown of roses " to the Mother of God. 
 
 " Yes, Mrs. O'Connell," said Miss Bourke. " Every 
 night of the year, both in and out of Lent. Even 
 when my mother was away my father would give it 
 out himself. He said it in English, but the farm ser- 
 vants sometimes answered in Irish, and Charles would 
 join in and pray very loud and very fast in Latin, or it 
 may have been Italian. He prayed so hard and so 
 fast that we small ones were hard set not to laugh out 
 loud." 
 
 Miss Bourke went on : 
 
 " My mother was very fond of your father, and he 
 came to our house whenever he liked. He had his own 
 seat at one particular corner of the dinner-table. 
 Once he walked in after we were all seated. The table 
 was quite full, and there was some little trouble in
 
 28 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 putting in an additional chair. When we all sat down 
 he was put into my mother's usual place, and she sat 
 down among us children. She noticed that he was not 
 eating so heartily as usual, and asked him what ailed 
 him. ' Don't you see, Mrs. Bourke, you have taken 
 my seat ? ' he said. Then she laughed, got up, and 
 changed places with your father, and he afterwards ate 
 his dinner in peace." 
 
 I then made a remark about the very fine print of 
 the " Ecce Homo," that hung on the wall of Miss 
 Bourke's room. The frame, though much tarnished, 
 had been richly gilt, and it was deeper than one 
 usually sees round print pictures. It flashed across me 
 that it might have been a gift of my father's, and I 
 therefore asked Miss Bourke if he had gilt it. 
 
 " Yes, Mrs. O'Connell ; your father gilded that frame. 
 "We had a raffle long ago for the chapel, and he made 
 us a present of that print, framed and glazed, just as 
 you see it ; and it was then considered a valuable prize. 
 The priest then gave him some tickets, and he, meeting 
 my little brother in the street, offered him one, which 
 won that picture." 
 
 We were then silent for a few moments, she busy 
 with old memories, and I thinking over all that she 
 had been telling me, when she turned the conversa- 
 tion, and began by speaking about my son. 
 
 " Tour boy ought to be good," said she. " Two 
 good strains, O'Connell and Bianconi. But why did 
 you call him John instead of Dan ?" 
 
 "He should be called John," I meekly answered,
 
 MISS BOURSE'S RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 29 
 
 alluding to the old Irish custom, as immutable as 
 the law of the Medes and Persians. " He should be 
 called John ; it was his father's father's name." 
 
 " Ah ! but Dan was the man of the people. "We 
 would have waded knee-deep in blood after him." 
 
 I ought, perhaps, here to explain that my late 
 husband was Morgan John O'Connell, a nephew of 
 Dan O'Connell, " the Liberator," as he was called in 
 Ireland. Miss Bourke's reverence for the great man 
 was so strong, that she would not hear any of my rea- 
 sons for calling my boy John, after his grandfather. 
 
 As the principal object of my visit was to get some 
 information about my father's shop in Clonmel, when 
 I had exhausted her earlier and fresher recollections I 
 turned my inquiries in that direction. Unfortunately 
 Cahir and Carrick were the towns that Miss Bourke 
 knew best, and she was only an occasional visitor at 
 Clonmel. 
 
 "I do not remember the shop so well," she said. 
 " I know it was a small shop, with a bow window, 
 and behind the window there was always a beautiful 
 mirror set in a rich frame." 
 
 But beyond that I perceived that I could get nothing 
 from her. I then thanked Miss Bourke for her kind- 
 ness, and bade her farewell.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE CORNER SHOP. 
 
 I HAVE had the greatest difficulty in finding details of 
 this period of my father's life. Any chain of events, 
 or any connecting links showing how things follow one 
 another, I have been quite unable to trace. All that I 
 can do is to put down truly such information as I have. 
 Fidelity, indeed, is the only virtue that this book can 
 have ; to literary skill I make no pretensions ; my 
 object is to show my father as he was, and the events 
 that his life brought forth. The Dick Whittington 
 qualities will, I believe, prove as successful in Ireland 
 as elsewhere, and the Irish people, if you treat them 
 fairly, are as good neighbours to trade with, to live 
 with, and grow rich with as any others. Such at any 
 rate was my father's belief. 
 
 I have already said that my father took lodgings in 
 Waterford, and there carried on business as a carver 
 and gilder. I have been given a quaint advertisement, 
 evidently detached from the back of a frame, showing 
 where he lived in Waterford. Unfortunately it bears 
 no date :
 
 THE CORNER SHOP. 31 
 
 " Charles Bianconi, Gilder and Print-seller, Looking- 
 " glass and Picture- frame Manufacturer, at Mr. Pren- 
 " dergast's, opposite the Royal Oak, George Street, 
 " Waterford, informs the Ladies and Gentlemen that 
 " he executes all kinds of Gilding in oil and burnished 
 " gold, equal to any other person in this country, and 
 " on as moderate terms. He frames and glazes Por- 
 " traits, Pictures, Prints, Drawings, and Looking- 
 " glasses, in the newest style, and on the shortest 
 " notice. 
 
 " N.B. Country commands by a line (post-paid, 
 " directed as above) will be punctually attended to. 
 " Bought of Charles Bianconi." 
 
 An old lady assures me that he dealt in musical 
 instruments as well as pictures, but I am inclined to 
 think that she has confounded him with a Doctor 
 Briscoli, who was a professor of music and a dealer in 
 musical instruments. 
 
 When my father rented the house in Clonmel, which 
 he always called " The Corner Shop," his business must 
 have been prosperous. The house is still standing, 
 though considerable alterations have been made in it. 
 Its present occupant is Mr. King, a butcher. When I 
 went to Clonmel I was shown over the house, and was 
 told of the alterations that had been made in it. Mr. 
 King also showed me a copy of the lease by which, in 
 1815, my father had surrendered his interest in the 
 premises. For this house my father had to pay a 
 premium of 55, and an annual rent of 40 ; and to
 
 32 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 enable him to meet these expenses he let some of the 
 upper rooms to lodgers. 
 
 His first tenant was a Miss Mary Anne K , a 
 
 fashionable milliner. Miss K was well connected 
 
 with some of the smaller Protestant gentry of that part 
 of the country, and she not unnaturally thought her- 
 self a person of more consequence than her landlord, 
 her junior in years, and who also was a tradesman, 
 a foreigner, and a Roman Catholic. I have been told 
 that she was a fine woman, and that she had the 
 imposing look that a Eoman nose will often give to a 
 
 face. Miss K had an aunt then living in Clonmel, 
 
 who used often to ask her niece to come and drink tea 
 with her and her daughter. This daughter, who is now 
 alive, is my authority for the story I am about to relate. 
 
 After Miss K had been my father's tenant for a 
 
 few weeks, he also was honoured with an invitation to 
 tea, and he, nothing loth to spend a pleasant evening 
 after he had done his day's work, sometimes went and 
 drank his tea with the ladies, not imagining that any- 
 thing could be required of him but to make himself 
 agreeable. 
 
 Sixty years have now passed since the days of the 
 pleasant little tea-parties, and my informant said to me 
 not long ago : " Your father, my dear ma'am, was not 
 the great man then that he became afterwards. He 
 was just beginning to get on, but he was so steady, and 
 such a nice, smart, clever-looking young man, that we 
 thought he would do nicely for Mary Anne." 
 
 Mary Anne's aunt was certainly determined to pro-
 
 THE CORNER SHOP. 33 
 
 vide a husband for her niece, if it were possible, for she 
 said to my father in a most resolute tone, " What is the 
 meaning of your attentions to my niece ? Do you pur- 
 pose seeking her in marriage ? " 
 
 " Bedad, ma'am," answered my father, " I have no 
 time to get married, but I'll get a good husband for 
 Miss Mary Anne." 
 
 Though the story was related to me so long after the 
 event took place, I can quite believe it, and can fancy 
 that I see it all, just as it took place. 
 
 A few days after my father had been so assailed, the 
 substitute came forward, pressed his suit, and was 
 accepted. The marriage turned out happily in every 
 way. The gentleman's business prospered, and my 
 father was enabled in after years to assist the sons of 
 his old friend. 
 
 It was probably after this little adventure that my 
 father began to hedge himself round with every pre- 
 caution against lady lodgers, and to avoid the society 
 of every unmarried woman. His next lodgers were two 
 artists, a Mr. Alpenny and his apprentice, Edward 
 Hayes. Mr. Hayes, in after years, became a member 
 of the Royal Hibernian Academy, and was well known 
 in Dublin as a water-colour portrait painter. He was 
 the father of Mr. Michael Angelo Hayes, whose narra- 
 tive of part of my father's life will form the subject of a 
 later chapter. I may as well say here that this Hayes 
 family was in no way connected with my mother's 
 family. My father was always fond of art himself, and 
 he received his new lodgers with a double degree of
 
 34 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 satisfaction. He was at any rate determined to have 
 no more Mary Annes. 
 
 As it was, the three bachelors clubbed together in 
 their household expenses, and though their fare was 
 always of the simplest kind, they were none the less 
 merry over it. Three-halfpenny worth of milk was 
 their allowance for tea, and this, through some arrange- 
 ment of their own, Mr. Hayes, the poor apprentice, 
 always had to buy. It was also his duty to boil the 
 kettle for tea; and when he and my father were both 
 white-headed grandsires my father would sometimes 
 playfully remind him of the evening when he was so ^ 
 engrossed in his book that he let the kettle boil over 
 and got scalded, and laughed at into the bargain. Mr. 
 Hayes was a man with some taste for letters. He used 
 often to read aloud to my father, who much preferred 
 this to reading himself. 
 
 My father soon began to employ assistants in his 
 business. Before he left the " Corner Shop " in Clonmel 
 he had in his employment three Germans, one of whom 
 was a woman ; and there was also Pat O'Neil, who 
 afterwards came to be head clerk in the car-office. Pat 
 O'Neil was the head gilder when my father gave up 
 the business ; and instead of carrying on the trade he 
 preferred to follow his master's fortunes. He remained 
 for a long while in my father's service, though before 
 his death he had become a rich and prosperous grocer. 
 
 Early in life my father learned the value of good 
 organization. As I have said, he was not a skilful 
 craftsman himself ; he therefore employed assistants to
 
 THE CORNER SHOP. 35 
 
 do much of the manual labour. And he did so, per- 
 haps, to a greater extent than most other men would 
 have dared en his limited income. While his work- 
 people were engaged in the shop, he would travel about 
 the country, sometimes walking and sometimes driving. 
 Occasionally he would deliver his goods himself, either 
 travelling with a great case upon an outside car, or 
 walking after the bearers, if the journey was short 
 enough to admit of the merchandise being conveniently 
 carried by men. And in a little time he started a 
 yellow gig, which in after years came to be very well 
 known in the country; On this gig he went about 
 soliciting orders and buying goods, and was everywhere 
 treated with kindness and hospitality. 
 
 I have had more difficulty in getting together trust- 
 worthy information for this period of my father's life 
 than for any other ; and yet it is one of the most im- 
 portant. It was at this time, when he was in his shop 
 in Clonmel, that he became an Irishman in mind and in 
 feeling. His thoughts were with the Irish people, not 
 only during the natural hours of work in the daytime, 
 but in the evening he used to assist in teaching in the 
 Scripture and Catechism classes. I was told by Mr. 
 Shaughnessy, of Clonmel, that he had been one of the 
 scholars in my father's Catechism class, and that he 
 used to find it very hard to understand my father's 
 speech, especially his improved explanations of the 
 Christian doctrine. Another gentleman of Clonmel 
 has told me a peculiar story of the manner in which 
 my father used to say his prayers in those days. I do
 
 36 CHABLES BIAXCONI. 
 
 not scruple to repeat it, because I believe it to be a 
 true characteristic trait of the man. Every Saturday 
 evening about eight o'clock Charles Bianconi was seen 
 to rush into the small dark Friary chapel and fling him- 
 self down on his knees before a certain confessor. Any 
 fair devotee that happened to be before him would be 
 requested by the priest to give way to the busy foreigner. 
 While a lady would be saying her Confiteor, Charles 
 Bianconi would have prayed and confessed and gone off 
 again. My father was a man of much practical religion, 
 but doubts or fears never troubled him in either spiritual 
 or temporal matters. He was a pure-minded, honest, 
 hard-working man ; he gave a fair share of his time 
 that with him was his money to the service of God and 
 his neighbour. He never troubled his director with 
 anything but his actual sins, and this may account for 
 the celerity with which he got through his religious 
 duties. When he did consult his friends the clergy, as 
 he was often in the habit of doing, it was at his office 
 desk or across his own mahogany table that the con- 
 ferences used to take place. 
 
 I have come across two unimportant documents be- 
 longing to these days of the " Corner Shop." One is 
 a bill for 12 for a chimney-glass in the year 1819. It 
 is written on a narrow slip of paper, and a quill pen 
 was probably used for the purpose. The handwriting 
 is more Italian in its character, and is less illegible 
 than it grew to be in the latter part of his life. There 
 seems to be some little retouching about the spelling of 
 the word "chimney.'* The letters e y were always a
 
 THE CORNER SHOP. 37 
 
 difficulty with him, and we had a standing joke against 
 him of spelling even "money" incorrectly; he would 
 write it " mony." I have also seen a bill paid by my 
 father to a Jew for a large number of ungilt frames that 
 he bought at the rate of 3s. a-piece. I have never been 
 able to ascertain how, when he left his business, he got 
 rid of all his stock ; whether he had an auction and 
 sold his prints, frames, glasses, &c., or whether, as he 
 sold off his goods, he failed to replace them. There are 
 still picture- frames and mirrors in the hotels in and about 
 Clonmel that came from his store, and some of these 
 show that at the time they were very richly gilded. 
 
 So far as I can gather, though my father liked the 
 town of Clonmel itself, he had more friends in Water- 
 ford, and friends of a more cultivated and respectable 
 class. I believe that, except a few old families in their 
 country-houses, and retired officers in the outskirts of 
 the town, there were few Catholic gentlefolk in or near 
 Clonmel. It is probable that when my father opened 
 his shop he was too well off to be patronised, and not 
 quite respectable enough to be treated as an equal by 
 the few old Catholic merchants. He kept pretty much 
 among the priests and their set for social enjoyment, 
 and avoided becoming intimate with those of his fellow- 
 shopkeepers who had well-filled tills, or were fathers of 
 pretty daughters. Seriously, I suspect that Mary Anne 
 had taught him a lesson, that he had made up his mind 
 to marry when he had acquired the means and the 
 position to do so, and having thus decided, he put the 
 matter out of his thoughts.
 
 38 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 However, I have been told of a quasi love affair of 
 my father's, which, on the whole, I am inclined to 
 believe. He was once made welcome at a country 
 house where there were daughters in the family. He 
 asked permission to educate one of the girls, in order 
 that in a few years' time she might become his wife. 
 Permission seems to have been given, and she was 
 placed in an Ursuline convent at Thurles, where she 
 was to remain for a certain time. When she came out 
 of the convent and went home to her father's house, 
 unfortunately for Charles Bianconi she fell in love with 
 a man whom everybody in Tipperary esteemed, the 
 popular and handsome Martin Lanigan. My father 
 saw the state of the case, and at once gave up all pre- 
 tension to her hand. But the wedding was not to be. 
 Mr. Lanigan died of injuries received during a con- 
 tested election, and the young lady who had loved him 
 devoted herself to his sister's children, and did not 
 marry until late in life. Of love, in the way that many 
 of us understand it, with romantic ideas and high 
 passions, my father was hardly capable. His head was 
 too full of the world and of the things of the world to 
 have time to idealize a woman, or dally with a graceful 
 image in his fancy, and find its realisation in some girl 
 that he had chosen. He understood love-making in the 
 foreign fashion, according to which, after a little private 
 negotiation between the parents, everything might be 
 comfortably arranged. And he had at that time the 
 foreign idea of a home where the wife is not so fully a 
 presiding deity as in the British household, but where
 
 THE CORNER SHOP. 39 
 
 the word " family " takes a wider meaning than with 
 us. Abroad the ties between parents and children are 
 stronger and more lasting, though the wife, as such, 
 holds a place of lesser importance. 
 
 But I hear a story of a romance elsewhere. My 
 father was, I am told, disposed to love another young 
 lady, a playful young girl whom he always used to call 
 by her pet name. This girl became a nun, and died 
 shortly after she made her religious profession. 
 
 There always seems to have been an idea, equally 
 prevalent among the most amiable and the most tyran- 
 nical rulers, that there is something mysterious in the 
 way that Ireland ought to be governed, and that the 
 ordinary principles of life will not hold good in that 
 country. These notions my father would laugh to 
 scorn. He not only believed them to be untrue, but he 
 thought them worthless. He would proudly appeal to 
 his own experiences as pedler, shopkeeper, car-owner, 
 landowner, alderman, mayor, county magistrate, grand 
 juror, deputy-lieutenant for his county everything, 
 in fact, but member of parliament ; and on this theme 
 he propounded the theory that the Irish people, ration- 
 ally treated, were very much the same as any other 
 race of men, and rather pleasanter to live with. He 
 had mixed with men of every grade ; his homelessness 
 in his boyhood had opened to him the hearts and houses 
 of Irish mothers of every class. Keeping his strong 
 individuality and his national traits, the Lombard 
 mountaineer had acquired in all else the feelings, pas- 
 sions, and prejudices of the people among whom his lot
 
 40 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 was cast. I can see now how, by slow and sure degrees, 
 he inhaled, as the air that he breathed, the aspirations 
 and the prejudices of his everyday neighbours. Doubt- 
 less, a common faith tended much towards the result. 
 
 My father had found many friends in Clonmel, espe- 
 cially among the clergy, and some of his greatest allies 
 were the Franciscan friars. In the penal times, 
 colleges of Irish Franciscans were founded on many 
 parts of the Continent. Munster men especially affected 
 those in Italy. St. Isidore's in Rome was ever a 
 favourite resort of young Tipperary friars, who became 
 very fond of their new country. Some of these returned 
 to Clonmel, and became my father's chosen associates. 
 For reasons that I cannot explain, among the disciples 
 of St. Francis who re- transplanted themselves to the 
 Irish soil, many " queer fellows," as the term was, 
 seemed to flourish to an extent that that blessed man 
 could never have foreseen. And it is noticeable among 
 our countrymen, that the high animal spirits and 
 strong sense of humour which constituted what long 
 ago was called a " queer fellow," are a great help to an 
 Irish priest in dealing with the people, and in helping 
 him to bear up against the many discomforts of his 
 holy office. Perhaps the Franciscan order is the most 
 perfect example of democracy extant : no wonder then 
 that its members threw themselves heart and soul into 
 the great national struggle for civil and religious 
 liberty in Ireland. From their order sprang the man 
 who originated the temperance movement, and at one 
 time almost divided with Daniel O'Connell himself
 
 THE CORNER SHOP. 41 
 
 the popular hero-worship. This special friar, Father 
 Mathew, my father had known as a boy going to 
 school in Thurles, then a singularly handsome lad, and 
 of specially gentle and winning manners. My father, 
 who, I am bound to say, could not boast of so mild a 
 temper, became once engaged in a boxing match with 
 one of the day scholars, and in that youthful duel he 
 decidedly got the worst of it. The future Apostle of 
 Temperance acted as his second and bathed his bleeding 
 nose. The friendship thus made between the two boys 
 grew afterwards into strong intimacy, and will account 
 for the very affectionate tone of Father Mathew's 
 letters to my father. 
 
 There was something grand in hearing my father 
 draw comparisons between the present and the past. I 
 have often heard him speak well of individual parsons ; 
 but if the disestablishment of the Irish Church had 
 meant the absolute quashing of Paganism, he could 
 not have exulted in it more triumphantly. He failed 
 to see how the working of the spirit of the age was 
 tending to sweep away all state religious endowments 
 and class privileges ; he did not see this, but he rejoiced 
 in the removal of the badges of servitude. I must do 
 him the justice to say that he regarded the Land Bill 
 with great moderation. He did not join in the foolish 
 clamour of some landlords, nor did He, like others, hail 
 it as a positive boon, but simply thought it a wise mea- 
 sure, making landlords do what a man of honour ought 
 to do in ordinary circumstances. I do not think that 
 my father was as vehemently ardent on the wrongs of
 
 42 CHARLES BIASTCONI. 
 
 tenants as he was about the wrongs of Papists. The 
 gross injustice of the tithes, and the still grosser abuses 
 in the manner of collection, were the points upon which 
 he was the most impetuous. I must note a curious 
 admission that once slipped from him. He then 
 acknowledged that such of the great Tory landlords as 
 were rich men and residents, were, in the main, good 
 landlords. This was an admission he was rather chary 
 of making, and on this occasion he dropped it by chance 
 rather than deliberately gave it in testimony. 
 
 In those days of the " Corner Shop " in Clonmel, Clon- 
 mel was the head-centre of the anti-Ascendancy party. 
 It was the town in which the revolution raged hottest 
 until the Roman Catholics ceased to be serfs. The agita- 
 tion led by Daniel O'Connell was a mighty and peaceful 
 uprising of Catholic Ireland. The cautious middle 
 classes were the very bone and sinew of the movement. 
 The priests were O'Connell's lieutenants. For once 
 landlord and tenant, employer and employed, forgot all 
 mutual distrust, and Emancipation was at last carried. 
 In the Liberator's boyhood the penal laws had been 
 so far relaxed that the Catholics t 'could take out long 
 leases, though it was not until later that a Catholic was 
 permitted to buy and become possessed of land. By a 
 still further relaxation of the penal laws, Catholics 
 were admitted to practice at the bar ; but whatever 
 success they attained in their profession they were not 
 allowed to sit on the Bench. Parliament was closed 
 against them, as was every post of honour and emolu- 
 ment held under Government.
 
 THE CORNER SHOP. 43 
 
 It is true that a price was no longer set upon the 
 head of their priests ; it was no longer necessary that 
 a Catholic who kept his faith should either quit the 
 country, or hold his land through the courtesy of a 
 Protestant who was the nominal owner, with power to 
 foreclose at any moment. Catholics were no longer 
 helots, but their position in the State was still so bitterly 
 galling that Macaulay compares them to the plebeians 
 in Rome under Yolumnius. 
 
 Had my father been born and bred in Clonmel, he 
 could not have thrown himself more vehemently heart 
 and soul into the cause. In his later years, his politics 
 toned down to a decorous and common- sense form of 
 Whiggery, but that stage of development was far 
 distant at the time of which I am speaking. In the 
 early days of the Catholic Association, he glowed all 
 over with a patriotic fervour, and his zeal was ardent 
 rather than discreetly tempered by the loyalty of after 
 years. I have reason to believe that the flame in his 
 breast was kindled and fanned by the insolence of the 
 Protestant shopkeepers, and the vexations these persons 
 continued to inflict upon their Catholic rivals. 
 
 Nothing could exceed the spite and animosity that 
 then showed itself almost hourly among the middle 
 classes. The two parties, Protestants and Catholics, 
 separated both by race and creed, hated each other 
 with a raging enmity that had been handed down from 
 one generation to another. The Catholics were just 
 beginning to lift up their heads, though, as it has been 
 said, it was a widow who first resisted the tax that the
 
 44 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 Protestants in Clonmel had for a long time past imposed 
 upon their neighbours. Joining together in one com- 
 mon cause, the Catholics began to feel that they were 
 men ; they had leaders of their own faith who, struggling 
 to obtain the brilliant prizes of political and judicial life, 
 allied themselves with their brethren, the traders and 
 the tillers of the soil. 
 
 Such was the little world in which Charles Bianconi, 
 the " alien Papist," opened his Corner Shop. He used 
 to say, sometimes, " While the big and the little were 
 fighting together, I grew up amongst them."
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 "THE BIANS." 
 
 BY this homely and familiar title Charles Bianconi's 
 once -famous cars were known all over Ireland, and he 
 wished the chief chapter of this book to be so designated- 
 It was between jest and earnest one evening, when my 
 father was particularly well pleased with my labours, 
 that he called out, " We'll call the book ' Charles Bian- 
 " coni, Car-Man;' and we'll have a grand chapter on 
 " the Bians." I turned to my good friend Mr. Anthony 
 Trollope for council, the only man equally versed in 
 books and in coaches to whom I could appeal. I asked 
 him, very much in doubt, whether it would become a 
 lady to head a chapter by what might seem to be a 
 slang name. And he answered me : " Certainly call 
 the cars the ' Bians.' The name became too well known 
 to be slang." Thus encouraged, I have written the old 
 familiar word in the post of honour ; though in defer- 
 ence to the wishes of my friends I have not put " Car- 
 man " on the title-page. 
 
 I would crave the indulgence of my reader for the 
 many deficiencies of this book. As I have said before,
 
 46 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 I do not profess to any literary ability ; but my short- 
 comings, I fear, do not end there. I am quite unversed 
 in horse-flesh and in book-keeping ; and the many exe- 
 crably badly written letters of my father's that I have 
 had to wade through, have either touched upon portions 
 of his life that would be uninteresting and unintelli- 
 gible to strangers, or they have, as is too often the case, 
 served only to give me a clue upon which to form my 
 j udgment of his many-sided existence. "When his loving 
 partiality made me what he called "an eldest son," it 
 became a sacred duty for me to carry out his wishes 
 concerning his written life. My own son, who is now 
 only six years old, is the old man's sole male descend- 
 ant ; and as I could not avail myself of his assistance, 
 I have single-handed been obliged to face the stable, 
 the ledger, and the road, thus trespassing on man's 
 domain, simply because there was no one to take the 
 work off my hands. "Needs must" has often carried 
 many a diligent toiler safely to the goal. Assuredly, I 
 began this task with no love of dabbling in ink, or for 
 any unwomanly desire for notoriety; but simply to 
 please my old father, and to help my husband, in whose 
 hands the work would have been done far differently. 
 
 It was at first begun to beguile the tedium of a quiet 
 winter in the country, continued half jestingly as a 
 pleasant family occupation, set aside for awhile after 
 my husband's death, then resumed in the hope of rous- 
 ing my father's flagging energies, again cast aside 
 at his death, and then finally taken up and finished 
 as a duty to be fulfilled. Such as it is, I have worked
 
 "THE BIANS." 47 
 
 it out alone, uncheered by the help and sympathy which 
 made its beginning so pleasant. Parts of it were 
 written with fun and laughter, and parts of it were 
 written with a sore heart. But through it all I have 
 endeavoured, so far as it lies in me, to give an accurate 
 picture of what my father was. Like other men he 
 had his whims and his weaknesses, and these I have 
 made plain, as I have also spoken of his kindliness of 
 heart, his love of justice, and of the good that he strove 
 to do to his fellow-creatures. 
 
 I was born just twenty years too late for my task ; 
 I have only the faintest memory of a journey on a 
 long Bian. After I had written much about them, 
 endeavouring to describe them as best I could from 
 hearsay and from pictures, I judiciously put what I had 
 written into the fire, as my artist friend, Mr. M. Angelo 
 Hayes, has given me a much better description of the 
 cars and of their manner of working than I could pos- 
 sibly have done. Mr. Hayes's narrative forms the sub- 
 ject of the following chapter ; few men know the Bians 
 better than he, for as a boy he lived exactly opposite to 
 the old coach-office in Hearn's Hotel, in Clonmel. 
 
 Mrs. Cantwell, who now owns the inn that was once 
 kept by Dan Hearn and his wife, has made many altera- 
 tions and improvements in the old place. Railways have 
 brought about a new state of things, and the daily bustle 
 that was once watched by many a spectator in the old 
 coachyard has since been moved to other places. During 
 my visit to the old Bian premises I had much difficulty
 
 48 CHAELES BIAXCONI. 
 
 in realising the contrast between the respectable, quiet 
 dulness of the main street of Clonmel, and the lively 
 scenes of noise and fuss it once presented. "Waterford 
 rather benefited by the railways, but the trade of 
 Clonmel for a long time suffered much by the new 
 system of locomotion ; there was a hardy colony of 
 bargemen altogether thrown out of employment. These 
 men had lived by conveying imported merchandise and 
 coals from Waterford through Carrick to Clonmel, and 
 by taking back the rich farm produce of Tipperary, Lime- 
 rick, and Waterford counties. This traffic, which had 
 been large, dwindled down to a small trade in coal and 
 heavy exports. Kilkenny was sufficiently large, and was 
 so centrally situated as not to be much affected by the 
 change ; but after the first train passed through Clonmel 
 the glory of the town departed. The 18 passenger cars, 
 the great reserve stables, the manufactories of coaches 
 and harness, the great smithies have all vanished. Clon- 
 mel is rather quieter now than when the lonely Italian 
 boy first walked under its quaint gateway towers. 
 
 Unlike many coach proprietors, my father had no 
 hotels of his own; but at Clonmel, Kilkenny, and 
 Waterford he adopted the following plan. He rented 
 large premises, reserving to himself the outer yards, 
 the great ranges of stables and corn storage, and he 
 sub-let the main houses, which he converted into hotels 
 for his agents ; he simply charged them what he had 
 paid his landlord. In this way his property was 
 protected from all risks. Hearn's hotel in Clonmel 
 consisted of two or three private houses thrown into
 
 "THE BIANS." 49 
 
 one. Cummins's Hotel in Waterford is the charming 
 old Georgian house of the Quan family, which my 
 father took from Mr. Thomas Meagher, M.P. As 
 Mr. Cummins, son of the late agent at Waterford, 
 bought from my father a portion of the Bians, I was 
 enabled to inspect the great old cars, and to see the 
 arrangements. Portions of the vast storage have been 
 turned to other uses. There were still great ranges of 
 triple stores, and low, close, roomy stables. I made 
 some remark about the hot air in the stables, but Mr. 
 Cummins assured me that he pinned his faith to my 
 father's axiom that a coach-horse cannot be kept too 
 warm, for a horse comes in in such a heatedstate from 
 short but quick and heavy work. 
 
 I fancy that in Waterford I got some idea of the 
 working of the large establishment. It was worked on 
 a peculiar plan, and was, perhaps, the most perfect 
 system that even Italian ingenuity ever suggested. 
 Never was man better fitted than my father for perpe- 
 tually watching and catching up ideas. His natural 
 passion for rushing about, his extreme sharpness, the 
 great quickness of his mind, of his hand, and of his 
 eye, seemed to destine him specially for some such 
 enterprise. I can never remember his staying an entire 
 week at home, unless he happened to be ill. 
 
 There was Dan Hearn, the kindest and most genial of 
 men, whose fine person and handsome face and mellow 
 voice were the delight of my childhood. He had a 
 peculiar and accurate knowledge of horses, knowing all 
 their points, and being able to tell nearly at a glance 
 

 
 50 CHARLES BIAXCONI. 
 
 how far such and such a beast would be serviceable. 
 He was my father's right-hand man, endowed with 
 almost unlimited powers, subject only to my father's 
 somewhat autocratic changes. Many a time after he 
 had gone through a whole district, casting screws, 
 adjusting the teams, making and testing his new pur- 
 chases, my father would swoop down after him and 
 upset all his nice arrangements. Mr. Hearn was, in a 
 word, the head agent, responsible to no one but my 
 father. His salary was, what would be now thought 
 small, 120 a-year; but my father "made it up to 
 him" in other ways. Dan Hearn, alone of all the 
 agents, had the power to draw cheques ; he purchased 
 most of the horses and nearly all the fodder. There 
 were three other agents, or inspectors, paid at the same 
 rate ; but the principal resident agents seldom received 
 more than from 52 to 72 a-year. In the smaller 
 towns the agents were generally shopkeepers, and they 
 received a commission of five per cent, on the money 
 that passed through their hands. 
 
 The drivers, whose perquisites in some cases were very 
 considerable, were paid in inverse ratio to the profits. 
 whence my father's standing joke, that the better 
 a driver was, the more he reduced his wages. Some ol 
 the famous coachmen only received 2*. 6d. a week. 
 On the night mails and the unfrequented roads their 
 wages went up to 15s. The reader will, of course, 
 recollect that 15s. a-week in Ireland, thirty or forty 
 years ago, meant a great deal more than it would now. 
 The helpers in the stables were paid from 10s. to 15s.
 
 " THE BIANS." 51 
 
 Some of them were at work all night, as the mail 
 traffic was mostly carried on during the night ; these 
 men were at work from six in the evening to six o'clock 
 in the morning. All the helpers had hard work : they 
 usually had each five horses to clean and feed, to har- 
 ness and unharness ; the drivers had to drive them and 
 to look after the vehicle. 
 
 In 1865, the year of the transfer of the establish- 
 ment from my father's hands, there were 130 agents, 
 85 drivers, and 200 helpers. The four travelling 
 agents, Mr. Hearn and his three colleagues, used to look 
 after the horses, see what horses were running on what 
 lines, make themselves acquainted with their condition, 
 as to how far they were good or bad, how they did their 
 work, and they had to keep each district supplied with 
 forage. In Clonmel, Sligo, and Galway, the three great 
 central depots, there were car factories, with about 
 twenty hands constantly employed in each. Besides 
 these there were th'e smiths and coach-builders ; but 
 these latter were only engaged for coach- build ing pur- 
 poses ; and in each of these towns there were two harness- 
 makers belonging to the establishment. It was always 
 a practice of my father's to give out the shoeing of the 
 horses to the local blacksmiths. 
 
 Besides the ordinary duties of booking passengers, 
 receiving and remitting fares, the agents had to submit 
 to a complicated system of way-bills. The agent 
 handed to each driver every morning a way-bill, show- 
 ing on the first page the driver's name, the name of the 
 horse or horses that ran in the car, of the towns passed
 
 52 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 through, and the hours of arrival or departure at each 
 place. On the second and third pages the names of 
 the passengers were entered, showing where they 
 started from and their place of destination, and the 
 amount of fare paid; the total sum of these various 
 amounts was of course filled in at the bottom. At .the 
 side of the page were the agent's initials, and under- 
 neath the particularities of the goods conveyed were 
 entered together with the charges of transport, and to 
 these the agent's initials were also placed. These way- 
 bills the agents had to copy out into their day-books, 
 and every three days they were sent to the head office 
 at Longfield, where my father lived after he left 
 Clonmel. Each agent had also to furnish monthly 
 accounts of receipts and expenditure, and these were 
 compared with the books in the office at Longfield, 
 into which all the way-bills had been previously copied. 
 Here all the accounts of the establishment were duly 
 checked, being posted into a large ledger, showing at a 
 glance in its many columns the daily and the monthly 
 receipts at every car-office. Every ten days the agent 
 had to furnish an account of the consumption of straw, 
 hay, and oats, with further particulars of the number 
 of horses, each animal's consumption, and the total 
 quantity consumed during the period, and the balance 
 in hand. From this it will be seen to what an elaborate 
 system of checks and counter- checks the agent had to 
 submit. My father's minute code of precautions even 
 extended to forbidding a groom's wife to keep hens, 
 lest the oats should find a wrong destination. Each
 
 "THE BIAXS." 53 
 
 horse was allowed daily 15 Ibs. weight of oats, in three 
 equal feeds, 16 Ibs. of hay, and 8 Ibs. of straw for bed- 
 ding. My father held that too much hay meant, 
 broken-windedness, and that the very small allowance 
 of litter was sufficient for practical uses. The slightest 
 excess in the consumption was charged to the agent, 
 which in one way or another he had to refund. One 
 of the best and most trusted agents in the western 
 district was once short of 28 barrels of oats, and he had 
 to supply the deficiency at his own cost, though there 
 was no suspicion of dishonesty attaching to him. 
 
 The most irksome portion of the agent's duty was 
 the night work, as he was obliged to take the way-bills 
 from the driver. The driver of a mail car first drove to 
 the post-office and delivered his mails, and then pro- 
 ceeded to the car-office, where the agent had to take 
 charge of the parcels and write up the way-bill ; he was, 
 in fact, expected to be at his post at the departure and 
 on the arrival of every car. And where female labour 
 was employed the work was the same. The women 
 were generally the wives or daughters of deceased 
 agents. My father was not at all averse to allow 
 women to occupy these posts ; he piqued himself upon 
 his power of reading faces, and he occasionally chose a 
 woman in preference to a man. He was not moved by 
 a pretty face or by any softness on the woman's part, 
 for in general he was very indifferent to female charms ; 
 but he made his choice where he perceived a general 
 air of intelligence and tact. At one time he had as 
 many as twenty female agents.
 
 54 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 In his own private office behind the dining-room his 
 excellent old secretary, Mr. Denis Francis O'Leary, 
 always sat at the desk opposite to my father. And 
 Dan Hearn, who scorned literary luxuries, used to pull 
 a chair towards the side of the table between them, and 
 with a stumpy bit of a quill pen, such as no one else 
 could have held in his hand, he wrote his business 
 letters concise, pithy, and often humourous, but the 
 writing itself looked like the characters on a tea-chest. 
 Then there was the back office in a building in the 
 house yard. There six or seven desks were kept at 
 work, one posting up the way-bills, another at the 
 expense account, a third at the ledger, two at the forage 
 returns, and two more at the index and the omissions. 
 My father's last private clerk, Denis Dwyer, has fur- 
 nished me with some particulars, and he showed me in 
 a few moments in one of those huge leather-bound 
 volumes that in the last year but one of my father's 
 ownership in 1864 the passenger traffic realised the 
 sum of 27,731, the mail contracts paid 12,000; 
 making altogether 39,731. 
 
 With all the avowed and acknowledged supervision, 
 my father had additional reports from spies ; these men 
 were supplied with money not merely to pay their fares, 
 but to tip the drivers. There was the spy proper who 
 was solely employed for the purpose until he became 
 too well known ; one of these ingenious gentlemen was 
 betrayed by his carpet-bag bursting and a quantity of 
 bran rolling out of it. Then there were occasional spies, 
 often schoolmasters out for a holiday, who were glad
 
 "THE BIANS." 55 
 
 enough of an opportunity of getting a free outing; 
 many and wondrous were the effusions of these peda- 
 gogues. There was an old bookseller traveller who 
 used to report in return for his free transit, and 
 there were sundry other similar characters who were 
 paid for their services in various ways. But there 
 were always two official spies regularly upon the 
 staff of the establishment. These " very much dreaded 
 officials," as my father's clerk styles them in the 
 paper I am now condensing, had to report the number 
 of passengers, which was invariably compared with 
 the number marked on the way-bills; they also re- 
 ported upon the state of the horses, of the harness and 
 the vehicles, the behaviour of the agents, drivers, 
 helpers, and especially the demeanour of the agent 
 towards the public. Civility, attention, and punc- 
 tuality were always rigidly enforced, and anything 
 calculated to offend the public was always punished. If 
 there was any discrepancy between the report given 
 by a spy, and the number of passengers, &c., marked 
 on the way-bill, the matter was immediately inves- 
 tigated, and an agent detected in falsifying a way- 
 bill was at once dismissed. The spies were obliged to 
 assume sundry aliases, and, I fear, to tell many un- 
 truths. They always had decent-looking luggage, 
 even though hay, bran, and stones were often the con- 
 tents of their bags. The drivers were ever on the 
 look out for them, and they displayed a marvellous 
 ingenuity in detecting their presence and in tele- 
 graphing the news along the line.
 
 56 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 How my father contrived to keep up the close and 
 intimate knowledge of every man and horse in his great 
 enterprise was a puzzle to everybody. He had beyond 
 doubt the best memory for faces that I ever knew ; it 
 was quite equal to what we hear of George III. The 
 very gradual growth of the establishment, of course, 
 helped this. It began with one ordinary jaunting-car, 
 and then it increased and multiplied, and took all sorts 
 of shapes and forms. I stoutly maintain my father's 
 great strength lay in his power of adaptability ; he was 
 not a discoverer, hardly an inventor, but no man was 
 quicker or keener to grasp all the bearings of a subject 
 and mould them to his own uses. 
 
 There is one circumstance told me by Father John 
 Ryan, P.P., who had heard it from my father, that I 
 must insert here. My father had begun his enterprise 
 with a very small capital ; though he rapidly and 
 steadily increased his traffic the great expenses he in- 
 curred by that very extension prevented much accumu- 
 lation of profit. Fodder for the horses, after the " war 
 prices " had gone down, was very cheap, and a spare 
 1,000 would have given him a perfect command of the 
 market. That spare 1,000 came to him in the follow- 
 ing way. I quote Father John's own words : 
 
 " The first thing that crops up here in my memory 
 " is his connection with the historic Waterford election. 
 " This was in 1826. The popular party had at first 
 " no idea of starting a candidate in opposition to the 
 " Beresford party, which was then considered all-power- 
 " ful, and Bianconi's cars were engaged by them. By-
 
 "THE BIANS." 57 
 
 " and-by Viiliers Stuart decided upon allowing himself 
 " to be put in nomination, and Bianconi was then 
 " applied to, as without his aid success was impossible. 
 " The morning after this application he was pelted with 
 " puddle. Coming up from the Friary Chapel, one or 
 " two of his cars and horses were heaved over the 
 " bridge, and he wrote to Beresford's agent stating that 
 " he could not risk the lives of his drivers and his own 
 " property on their side, and declaring off. He then 
 " engaged with the popular party, and certainly enabled 
 " them to gain the glorious victory they achieved. This 
 " election lasted for several days. At its termination 
 " the sum of 1,000 was paid to him. Before this he 
 " was always at the mercy of the market ; with that 
 " amount of ready cash, oats were then as low as 6d. a 
 " stone, and hay and other provisions at a corresponding 
 "low price, he bought up and laid in such a quantity 
 " of forage of every sort, as kept him independent of 
 " the market for the future. Immediately after this he 
 " got married, and the money that he thereby acquired, 
 " made him still more able to command the market. I 
 " should also place on record that Mr. Bianconi always 
 " allowed a suitable pension to the wife, or mother, or 
 " children of any man who lost his life or his health 
 " in the establishment as helper, or groom, and some- 
 " times as driver ; and should also mention that he 
 " allowed half-a-crown to every patient leaving the 
 " fever hospital, who presented at the office a certificate 
 " from his clergyman no matter of what religion. 
 " Though he was very generous in his charities, he
 
 58 CHAELES BIAXCONI. 
 
 " was most punctual and exact in his money dealings. 
 " He went into Hearn's Hotel one day and said to the 
 " barmaid, ' Judy, I was in London last week, and I 
 " ' did not forget you.' She thanked him. * I brought 
 " ' you a tea-urn/ he said. He sent the urn to the hotel 
 " that evening, and a day or two after he called and 
 " said to the girl, * Judy, you owe me 5s. 9%d.' ' What 
 " ' for, sir ?' 'For the tea-urn I brought you.' ' Oh, sir, 
 " ' I thought that was a present you sent us.' ' Come, 
 " ' come, no talk, but pay me what you owe me.' She 
 " gave him 5s. 8d., all the money that was in the till. 
 " On the day following he called again at the inn, and 
 " said, 'Judy, you owe me three half-pence of the 
 " * price of the tea-urn.' Judy paid him the money, 
 " but kept telling the story for some time afterwards." 
 
 I have invariably heard my father say that no man 
 was better served than he was. His rule was a patri- 
 archal despotism ; his orders were to be obeyed without 
 a murmur of dissent, he had a horror of men who asked 
 why and wherefore. Provided that he was obliged 
 briskly and thoroughly, he tolerated a considerable 
 liberty of speech. Many a time I have heard him 
 laugh at a saucy answer; certain cranky helpers in- 
 variably swore at him when he made them do what they 
 did not like. 
 
 English tourists have often told me what delightful 
 opportunities of seeing the people and the country his cars 
 have afforded them. Though the drivers had orders to fill 
 all the vacant places with poor people, especially women 
 carrying babies on their backs, still they very gene-
 
 "THE BIAXS." 59 
 
 rally succeeded in separating the poorer from the better 
 classes. In nothing is the Celtic quickness more re- 
 markable than in the prompt discrimination of classes, 
 and the faculties of these men became sharpened by 
 long practice. Still it did sometimes happen that a 
 disciple of daily scrubbing and tubbing found him- 
 self in closer quarters than was pleasant with a poor 
 harvester or a female tramp, whose clothing was not of 
 the nicest kind. My father at first evidently only 
 contemplated carrying the poorer people ; there was 
 the lordly mail coach for the " quality." Had he pos- 
 sessed a spirit of artistic keeping he would have 
 eschewed coaching altogether, and kept to his own 
 peculiar line. But circumstances were too strong for 
 him, and he became a great coach-owner, both in part- 
 nership with others and on his own account. He pur- 
 chased the great coaching business of the Hartleys and 
 the Bournes. He had also been a partner with the late 
 John Talbot, of Ballybrent, as fine a specimen of an old 
 Irish gentleman as the heart of man could desire. 
 My father always maintained that he was the rightful 
 Earl of Shrewsbury, and my husband, who had been in 
 the House of Commons with him, more than confirmed 
 my father's eulogies on Mr. Talbot. 
 
 My father was an old servant of the post-office, for 
 which department he entertained a great regard. 
 Judging by the vast pile of post-office letters I have 
 found in his pigeon-holes, and the somewhat grumbling 
 tone of many of them, I should imagine him to have 
 been a loyal but a very turbulent vassal. If he liked and
 
 60 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 trusted the post-office surveyor he would help him to get 
 the public well served. Once when a most special friend 
 of his found himself obliged to provide mail contractors 
 in the north without adequate means from head- quarters, 
 my father got him nobly out of the difficulty by threaten- 
 ing the northern monopolists to come down upon them 
 with half his forces and contest the road; a threat 
 which procured the required accommodation on fair 
 terms, but which " the wily Italian/' as certain Clonmel 
 folk called him, warned his friend was solely a threat, 
 and that he never really intended to do the thing. 
 
 In the spring of this year I visited Waterford, and 
 was of course charmed with the beauty of the place, 
 and with hearing the tales of bygone days. In the 
 room I occupied there hung a fine old print, the frame 
 of which had been gilded by my father, and given by 
 him to old Mrs. Cummins. And I got some informa- 
 tion from her son, Father George Cummins, who recol- 
 lected the names and reputation of the coachmen on the 
 road when he was a boy at school. I will now let him 
 tell his own story. 
 
 " Cummins' s Hotel stands about in the middle of the 
 " quay at Waterford, and there every day at three 
 " o'clock in the afternoon there used to be a scene of 
 " business and bustle, not unmixed with merriment, 
 " that never failed to attract a crowd to see the start- 
 " ing of the Bians. At two o'clock the preparations 
 " began ; the huge vehicles were drawn out before the 
 " door of the hotel, and luggage from all quarters 
 " came down on trucks, or on the backs of men
 
 "THE BIANS." 61 
 
 " and of boys. And from the hotel, whilst impatient 
 " and business-like commercial men were providing, at 
 " the ample table d'hote, against the hardships of the 
 " road, that valuable servant the ' boots ' might be seen 
 " bearing case after case of heavy luggage to be stowed 
 " in the well or piled up on the top of the car. Then 
 " came the cynosure of many eyes, the coachman, fol- 
 " lowed by a boy carrying his whips, for the coach- 
 " man who thought well of himself always carried a 
 " spare tormentor. He walks along slowly, bending 
 " under the burden of many caped coats and rugs, and 
 " as each driver arrives his merits are criticized and 
 " decided upon by the knowing ones who are skilled in 
 " horse-flesh. Already ' boots ' has secured the post of 
 " vantage the box-seats for his favourites, and dan- 
 " gling down may be seen the flash rugs of well-known 
 " commercial men in evidence of possession gained. As 
 " the hour approaches the guests come forth from the 
 " hotel dressed in all the varied fashion of travelling 
 " costume, fur rugs, glaring mufflers, wonderful top- 
 " coats, and cunning devices of all kinds for keeping out 
 " the cold or keeping in heat. Tobacco-pipes of curious 
 " and grotesque patterns astonish and delight the inqui- 
 " sitive lookers-on, and many an apprentice, who lingers 
 " in open-mouthed admiration at the travellers, wonders 
 " if it shall ever be his good fortune to get on ' the road.' 
 " The packing of the luggage on these cars was a work 
 " demanding skill and experience, and it not infrequently 
 " happened that some one, anxious to reach his home, 
 " would gladly accept a seat on the ' well/ on the top
 
 62 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " of the piled-up packages, when a place upon either 
 " side of the car was not to be had. The principal 
 " attraction, however, was the arrival of the horses, and 
 " for many years the skill and coolness of Pat Dillon 
 " was the delight of the passengers on their journey, 
 " and of the crowd who watched him handle the reins 
 " at starting. The Clonmel car was known by its grey 
 " horses, and by its prominent position in the group. 
 " For many years a very remarkable horse named 
 " Fender ran the lead in this conveyance, and though 
 " he was stone blind, and was very spirited and impa- 
 " tient, the masterly Pat Dillon could steer him without 
 " a mistake through the country carts, and around 
 " sharp and ugly corners. Pender could never be put 
 " to until the moment of the start ; he was always led 
 " up and down, and was the cause of much admiration 
 " among the bystanders. He was a grey horse of the 
 " most perfect symmetry, stout of limb, and well rounded 
 " at the quarters, and had none of the lankiness so 
 " often seen in coach-horses. Not until after Dillon 
 " had seated himself, and given a complacent look 
 " round at the well-filled car, which represented to him 
 " perquisites to the amount of ten or fifteen shillings, 
 " and he had received the way-bill from the bustling 
 " agent, and had assured himself that the wheelers 
 " were all right, it was not until then that Pender 
 " could be run into his place. In a second the reins 
 " were passed by two attending grooms up to the box, 
 " and the eager horse, rearing with impatience, started 
 " off admidst the plaudits of the crowd. ' Now for
 
 "THE BIANS." 63 
 
 " ' Kilkenny ! ' cries out the agent ; and all eyes were 
 " withdrawn from the receding Clonmel car to the one 
 " about to start for Kilkenny. Among the coachmen of 
 " the day there was no one more popular on the road 
 " than William Mullaly. He was a young man whose 
 " family connections and his education entitled him to 
 " a more respectable position, but his love of horses, 
 " and his desire for ' fingering the ribbons ' led him to 
 " adopt as a trade what he had practised as an amateur. 
 " The perquisites on the "Waterford and Kilkenny line 
 " were generally good, and that no doubt proved a strong 
 " argument with him. Mr. Bianconi, for many years, 
 " was opposed by a rival car-owner in a very spirited 
 " manner on this line. That afforded to Mullaly many 
 " opportunities of displaying his daring and his skill in a 
 " manner not always pleasant to travellers ; yet, though 
 " he never allowed himself to suffer a ' go-by,' he was 
 " never known to have met with a serious accident. 
 " And there was Tom Keogh, too, a name familiar to 
 " all who knew the Bianconi establishment, who spent 
 " over thirty years on the box-seat of the 'Dungarvan.' 
 " As remarkable for his politeness to ladies, and his ten- 
 " demess to weakness in distress, as he was for his 
 " brusqueness to the rougher sort of customers on his 
 " drive, he was a general favourite with all decently 
 " behaved people, and he was the terror of the sailors 
 " who travelled much upon his road. Poor Tom clung 
 " so affectionately to his accustomed occupation that at 
 " last he had literally to be lifted down from his seat. 
 " For no amount of telling was of any avail, even after
 
 64 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " he had got old, and had become incapable through 
 " weakness. 
 
 " Mr. Edward Cummins, the proprietor of Cummins's 
 " Commercial and Family Hotel, was Mr. Bianconi's 
 " agent at Waterford. This connection dates back to 
 " the year 1821 or 1822, and was continued through 
 " the Cummins family up to the period of the selling 
 " of the establishment, when the Dungarvan, Passage, 
 " and New Ross lines passed by purchase to Messrs. 
 " W. K. and P. Cummins. In the heyday of the estab- 
 " lishment, Waterford was one of the most important 
 " depots in the country. On Sundays, when all the 
 " horses working into that city were resting, the stables 
 " usually contained forty animals. The hotel being 
 " the centre of this traffic, was naturally a place of 
 " great business and bustle. Mrs. Cummins, who 
 " directed and managed the affairs of the house, com- 
 " bined all her native quickness, intelligence, and 
 " energy, together with a certain motherly tenderness 
 " and matronly dignity. She was well and extensively 
 " known ; and the hospitality that was gracefully and 
 " generously dispensed by her gave to the hotel a cha- 
 " racter of homeliness almost peculiar to it. Among the 
 " patrons and staunch friends of Mrs. Cummins there 
 " was no one who esteemed her worth or appreciated 
 " her more truly than Mr. Biauconi. His plate-chest, in 
 " the early days of her housekeeping, was always at her 
 " command, when some unusual thronging at assizes or 
 " elections, in those stirring days of the Agitation, made 
 " more than usual demands upon the resources of her
 
 "THE BIANS." 65 
 
 " establishment. When he visited "Waterford in after 
 " times, it was his delight to accept the hospitality of 
 " the house, to take an interest in the family affairs, 
 " and to talk pleasantly over old scenes and acquaint- 
 " ances. He consented to be a sponsor for one of Mrs. 
 " Cummins's children, and on the day of the baptism 
 " he deposited 50 in the National Bank, in the name 
 " of his god-child, which, with the interest thereon, 
 " was to be given to him on his twenty-first birthday. 
 " It was amusing to note the little contrivances that 
 " the ingenuity of his hostess discovered to gratify the 
 " fancies of her kind patron. Mr. Bianconi, though 
 " by no means a gourmand, was well known to have 
 " his little peculiar tastes. Things usually disregarded 
 " or despised by the lovers of good living were to him 
 " the greatest treats. He could make a feast upon 
 " cockles, and pig's head was a rarity that he looked 
 " forward to with great pleasure. Young veal, which is 
 " humorously called ' staggering Bob,' was to him quite 
 " a bonne louche, and he also confessed to a weakness 
 " for tripe. In Waterford he used to revel in all these 
 " whims, much to his own and his friends' amusement. 
 " In the season he always took home some of the pecu- 
 " liar pickled cockles of the place." 
 
 I will here insert the narrative of Mr. John Walsh, 
 who first entered into my father's service as a boy, just 
 after he had left the National School, and who is now 
 so deservedly respected by all that know him, that any 
 further praise of mine would be needless. He and his 
 partner, Mr. Kennedy O'Brien, who was literally born 
 
 P
 
 66 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 in the establishment, purchased the Western lines from 
 my father. 
 
 "SLIGO, January 15th, 1876. 
 
 " DEAR MRS. O'CoxNELL, In compliance with your 
 " wish, I now give you a brief sketch of my connection 
 " with the late Mr. Bianconi, whose death I deeply 
 " deplore ; for, though he was kind to all, he seemed to 
 " take quite a fatherly interest in me. 
 
 " On this day twenty-six years ago my father took 
 " me to Longfield. I was then only a boy, not sixteen 
 " years old. I was shown into the parlour where Mr. 
 " Bianconi was alone, and he said to me, ' John, I am 
 " going to send you to Clonmel to learn the business, 
 " and I will make a man of you. The first thing you 
 " will do when you go there is to buy a saucepan. 
 " You will see the women going round the town every 
 " morning with cans of milk on their heads ; buy a 
 " pennyworth of new milk and add a mug of water to 
 " it ; boil that and get a twopenny loaf ; and, By the 
 " Hokey ! you will have a breakfast fit for any man. 
 " Now, as to wages, I will not give you much money, 
 " as it would only spoil you : I will give you half-a- 
 " crown a-week, to begin with ! ' 
 
 " It was with feelings of delight I started the next 
 " morning on the early car. I was free, and would 
 " have to go to school no more, little dreaming I had a 
 *' great deal more to learn. I arrived in Clonmel in due 
 " time, and after going through a few streets, we pulled 
 " up at the office, next to Mr. Hearn's Hotel. My ideas 
 " of the establishment became at once confused, and I
 
 "THE BIANS." 67 
 
 " was lost in amazement at the magnitude of the 
 " place, as I was shown round it. At the back of the 
 " hotel and office was a large yard ; on the right was 
 " the harness- room, where five men were busy work- 
 " ing ; higher up there were three forges with eight 
 " smiths, all of them busy with their irons ; on the left 
 " was the timber- shop, where a foreman and his wheel - 
 " wrights were engaged ; above that were the hospital 
 " stables, capable of holding sixteen horses ; and in a 
 " loft over the stables and timber- shop two men were 
 " always at work making new cars, and another man 
 " painting them. Mr. Quirk, a good and kind man, 
 " superintended this department. I was next brought 
 " to a square yard on the other side of the street, where 
 " forty horses stood in charge of six grooms ; and I 
 " soon afterwards learned that all these horses went 
 " out every day and others came back in their places. 
 " Cars drawn by three and coaches drawn by four 
 " horses came in and went out so fast, that for days I 
 " was bewildered and did not know what to think. 
 " There were four came from and went out to Water- 
 " ford, three to Tipperary, three to Gooldscross, one to 
 " Cork, one to Kilkenny, one to Youghal, and one to 
 " Fethard. 
 
 " I must candidly acknowledge that I did nothing, 
 " nor was I able to do anything for a long time, 
 " though in about a fortnight Mr. Bianconi told my 
 " father I was a great fellow, and that my wages were 
 " to be doubled from that day. Soon after I was raised 
 " to eight and then to ten shillings, for merit I did not
 
 68 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " possess. And as I became useful, on the retirement 
 " of Mr. Quirk to Mount Mellery, I was raised to twelve 
 " shillings a- week, at which it remained for a long time. 
 
 " The opening of the railway from Tipperary to 
 " Clonmel, and ultimately to Waterford, reduced us so 
 " much, that the agent, Mr. Connell, retired. The 
 " whole management was then entrusted to me. In 
 " about four months, thinking I was forgotten, I told 
 " Mr. Bianconi that when I was no good he raised my 
 " wages fast enough, but now when I was doing every- 
 " thing he forgot me. He said to me, ' I am glad you 
 " reminded me of it ; you will now have fifteen shillings 
 " a- week from the time Mr. Connell left.' 
 
 " On the 24th of April 1854, I was sent as agent to 
 " Athenry, in the county Galway, at 1 a week, where 
 " an immense trade was done on the Westport line 
 " with passengers, parcels, and fish. I was very coii- 
 " tented for about eighteen months, when I applied for 
 " a change, and was promised Sligo. But Mr. Bianconi 
 " was induced to change his mind, and he told me in 
 " Longfield I was to go back again to Athenry, which 
 " I refused to do. He insisted that I should, and that 
 " I should have an increase of pay from the time I was 
 " twelve months there. I asked how much, but he 
 " would not tell me until I should be there two years. 
 " Of course I went back, and when the time had 
 " expired, I had a letter to say that my salary was to 
 " be 60 a-year, to date from a twelvemonths after I 
 " had been there. 
 
 " On one of my visits afterwards to Longfield, Mr.
 
 "THE BIAXS." 69 
 
 11 Bianconi asked me if it was true that I was going to 
 " be married. I told him it was not. He then asked 
 " was there anything about a certain lady, and if she 
 " had a lot of money. I said she had money. ' But 
 " you would not marry her,' he said. I said, ' No.' 
 " ' That's right,' said he ; ' never marry for money, but 
 " marry for love.' 
 
 " My long and faithful service at that station, five 
 " years, was rewarded. In 1859 I did get married, and 
 " was then moved to Sligo, where a large field was open 
 " to me. We had thirty-three horses standing in charge 
 " of six grooms ; a long car came from and went out 
 " daily to Enniskillen, one to Strabane for Derry, one 
 " to Westport, one to Bellaghy, and three coaches to 
 " Mullingar and Longford, meeting the train to Dublin, 
 " on one of which the far-famed guard, M'Clusky, tra- 
 " veiled. I could not attempt to describe the ready 
 " wit or the good-humoured jokes with which he made 
 " up stories suitable for his passengers. For the days 
 " that he was to be on the coach seats were often secured 
 " a week beforehand, so popular was he with the tra- 
 " vellers. 
 
 " In July, 1862, the workmen were removed from 
 " Longford to Sligo ; and, as I had always made strong 
 " representations against building the cars so heavy, I 
 " hoped to be able to remodel them ; but, strange to 
 " say, Mr. Bianconi would not consent, and it was only 
 " in May, 1865, when he saw one of a light weight that 
 " I had just finished building, and I had proved to him 
 " that it was as strong as one of the old kind, which
 
 70 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " was once and a half as heavy, that he consented to 
 " have all the others made lighter. The opening of 
 " the railway from Longford to Sligo did away with 
 " our coach line, but I soon found that it made an 
 " opening for a summer car to Bundoran ; and having 
 " put my views before Mr. Bianconi, he immediately 
 " sent me the horses asked for, and was so well pleased 
 " with the result that he ordered me to charge him with 
 " commission on the receipts in addition to my salary, 
 " a thing unprecedented in the establishment. In 
 " the year 1866 he wrote to Mr. O'Brien, the travelling 
 " agent, to meet him here in Sligo ; and when we had 
 " talked over business, he said, ' I have brought ye 
 " together to know would ye buy all my establishment 
 " to the north and west of the line between Dublin and 
 " Galway.' "We agreed to do so, but his own accident, 
 " which happened soon afterwards, put an end to the 
 " arrangement. However, he sent for us in March, 
 " 1867, and sold to us the portion we each required at 
 " our own price. Mine extended from Westport, in 
 " Mayo, to Letterkenny, in County Donegal ; and after 
 " the purchase was made out, Mr. Bianconi said his 
 " terms were half the money in hand, and the other 
 " half in monthly instalments. I told him that in that 
 " case I could not treat with him. He said, ' What do 
 " you mean ? You have money.' I said, ' If I have, 
 " I am not going to give it to you. If you expect ever 
 " to be repaid you must not only trust to our word, but 
 " you must give us plenty of money to work the lines.' 
 " He paused for a long time, and kept looking at me.
 
 "THE BIANS." 71 
 
 " Then he said, ' John, you are right ; it shall be as 
 " you say.' It is needless to add that he did so, and 
 " long after I had paid him back he would try to force 
 " me to take money I did not want, and he always 
 " manifested that interest in my business which caused 
 " me to apply to him in any cases of difficulty for his 
 " advice, which was cheerfully given, and which I am 
 " sorry to say I shall miss for the future. 
 
 " I must apologize, dear Mrs. O'Connell, for the 
 " length of this letter, but I had to touch on the various 
 " stages to show that he fulfilled his promise when he 
 " said that he would make a man of 
 
 " Your faithful servant, 
 
 " JOHN WALSH." 
 
 The following is an extract from Mr. Anthony Trol- 
 lope's History of the Irish Post-office, published in the 
 Postmaster-General's Report for 1857 : 
 
 " In 1827, and for many years previously, the pay- 
 ment for carrying the mails was 5d. the double Irish 
 mile. The average is still much the same, being 2d. 
 the English mile, which is within a fraction equal to 5d. 
 the double Irish mile. But though the work done is no 
 cheaper, it is much better. The old system of getting 
 the cross mails carried by any animal that the conscience 
 of the local postmaster thought good enough for such a 
 service does not, however, appear to have been interfered 
 with by the authorities, but to have been gradually 
 amended by the commercial enterprise of a foreigner,
 
 72 CHARLES BIANCONT. 
 
 " In 1815 Mr. Bianconi first carried his Majesty's 
 mails in Ireland, but he did so for many years without 
 any contract. He commenced in the County Tipperary, 
 between Clonmel and Cahir, and he then made his 
 own bargain with the postmaster, as he did for many 
 subsequent years. The postmaster usually retained 
 one moiety of the sum allowed as his own perquisite, 
 and Mr. Bianconi performed the work for the re- 
 mainder. The sum that Mr. Bianconi received was 
 thus very small, and therefore he could not, and would 
 not, run his cars at any hours inconvenient to his pas- 
 senger traffic, or any faster than was convenient to 
 himself. 
 
 " From 1830, when the English and Irish Post- 
 offices were amalgamated under the Duke of Richmond, 
 the public, as Mr. Bianconi says, got something like 
 fair play, and he and others were allowed to carry the 
 mails by direct contract with the Post-office. 
 
 " From that time till 1848 Mr. Bianconi continued 
 to increase his establishment, and in latter years he had 
 1,400 horses, and daily covered 3,800 miles. The open- 
 ing of railways has, however, so greatly interfered with 
 his traffic as to expel his cars from the main lines. But 
 Mr. Bianconi has met the changes of the times in a reso- 
 lute spirit. He has always been ready at a moment's 
 notice to move his horses, cars, and men to any district, 
 however remote, where any chance of business might 
 show itself. And now, in the winter of 1856 and 1857, he 
 still covers 2,250 miles, and is the owner of above 1,000 
 horses, working in the four provinces from the town of
 
 "THE BIANS." 73 
 
 "Wexford in the south-east to the mountains of Donegal 
 in the north-west. Mr. Bianconi has done good service. 
 By birth he is well known to be Italian ; but he is now 
 naturalised, and England, as well as Ireland, should be 
 ready to acknowledge his merits. It may perhaps be 
 said that no living man has worked more than he has 
 for the benefit of the sister kingdom. 
 
 " While on the subject of the conveyance of mails, it 
 may be well to point out that it was reported in 1829 by 
 the Commissioners, who had then for many years been 
 inquiring into the Irish Post-office, that the night mail- 
 coaches then working, and which covered 1,450 miles, 
 cost upwards of 30,000, whereas the same conveyance 
 over the same distance in England would, according to 
 the evidence of Mr. C. Johnson, the English superin- 
 tendent of mail-coaches, have cost only 7,500. This 
 was the more singular, as forage and labour were much 
 cheaper in Ireland than in England. But it was ac- 
 counted for by the fact that the whole business was in 
 the hands of a very few persons, and that the local inn- 
 keepers could not be induced to embark in the trade. 
 To that cause may probably be added this other, that at 
 the period in question jobbing was not yet extinct in 
 Ireland. The excess has, however, entirely disappeared. 
 Indeed, in Ireland the work is now done cheaper than 
 in England, the cost in England being 2^d. a mile ; 
 in Scotland, 2^d. ; in Ireland, 2d* 
 
 " In no part of the United Kingdom has more been 
 
 * These were the rates in 1855. But in 1856 the rates were, in 
 England, 1\d. ; Scotland, 3rf. ; Ireland, Id.
 
 '4 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 done for the welfare of the people by the use of rail- 
 ways for the carrying mails, and by the penny post- 
 age, than in Ireland. In 1784 there were then posts 
 six days a week on only four lines of road, letters to all 
 other places being conveyed only twice or thrice a 
 week. Now there are daily posts to almost every 
 village, and I know of but one important town that has 
 not two daily mails both with London and Dublin. I 
 think this proves, as regards the Post-office, that the 
 Government has not forgotten its paternal duties. 
 
 " ANTHONY TROLLOPE." 
 
 The following papers give some statistics of my 
 father's coach and car establishment. They are a 
 collection of papers read at meetings of the British 
 Association for the Advancement of Science, and of 
 the National Association for the Promotion of Social 
 Science. They were published collectively in Dublin 
 in the year 1869, and by my father's express wish I 
 now here reproduce them. 
 
 I. PAPER READ BY MR. BIANCONI AT THE CORK MEETING 
 or THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCE- 
 MENT OF SCIENCE, August 19th, 1843. 
 
 UP to the year 1815, the public accommodation for the 
 conveyance of passengers in Ireland was confined to a 
 few mail and day coaches on the great lines of road. 
 
 From my peculiar position in the country, I had 
 ample opportunities of reflecting on many things, and
 
 "THE BIANS." 75 
 
 nothing struck me more forcibly than the want of a 
 cheap and easy means of locomotion. The inconveni- 
 ence felt by this want of more extended means of inter- 
 course, particularly between the different market towns, 
 gave great advantage to the few at the expense of the 
 many; and it also caused a great loss of time. For 
 instance, a farmer living twenty or thirty miles from 
 his market town spent the first day in going there, a 
 second day in doing his business, and a third day in 
 returning. 
 
 In July, 1815, I started a car for the conveyance of 
 passengers from Clonmel to Cahir, which I subse- 
 quently extended to Tipperary and Limerick. At the 
 end of the same year I started similar cars from 
 Clonmel to Cashel and Thurles, and from Clonmel to 
 Carrick and "Waterford ; and I have since extended my 
 establishment into the most thinly populated localities. 
 I have now cars running from Longford to Ballina and 
 Belmullet, which is 201 miles north-west of Dublin, from 
 Athlone to Gal way and Clifden, 183 miles due west of 
 Dublin, from Limerick to Tralee and Caherciveen, 
 233 miles south-west of Dublin. There are now in 
 the establishment 100 vehicles, including mail-coaches 
 and different-sized cars, capable of carrying from four 
 to twenty passengers each, and travelling eight or nine 
 miles an hour, at an average of one penny farthing per 
 mile for each passenger, and which in all perform daily 
 3,800 miles, pass through over 140 stations for the 
 change of horses, and consume from 3,000 to 4,000 
 tons of hay, and from 30,000 to 40,000 barrels of oats,
 
 76 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 annually, both of which are purchased in their respective 
 localities. 
 
 The establishment is not at work on Sundays, with 
 the exception of those portions of it as are in connec- 
 tion with the Post-office or canals, for the following 
 reasons : first, the Irish being a religious people, will 
 not travel on business on Sundays ; and secondly, 
 experience teaches me that I can work a horse eight 
 miles per day, six days in the week, much better than 
 I can six miles for seven days ; and by not working on 
 Sundays, I effect a saving of 12 per cent. 
 
 The advantages derived by the country from this 
 establishment are almost incalculable ; for instance, 
 the farmer who formerly drove, spent three days in 
 making his market, can now do so in one, for a few 
 shillings ; thereby saving two clear days, and the 
 expense and use of his horse. 
 
 The example has been generally followed, and cars 
 innumerable leave the interior for the principal towns 
 in the south of Ireland, which bring parties to and 
 from markets at an enormous saving of time, and in 
 many instances cheaper than they could walk. 
 
 The establishment has been in existence twenty-eight 
 years, travelling with its mails at all hours of the day 
 and night, and has never met any interruption in the 
 performance of its arduous duties. Much surprise has 
 often been expressed at the high order of men con- 
 nected with it, and at its popularity : but people who 
 thus express themselves forget, I think, to look at Irish 
 society with sufficient grasp. For my part, I cannot
 
 " THE BIANS." 77 
 
 tetter compare it than to a man becoming convales- 
 cent after a serious attack of malignant fever, and 
 requiring generous and nutritious food, in place of 
 medical treatment. I take my drivers from the lowest 
 grade of the establishment ; they are progressively 
 advanced according to their respective merits, as 
 opportunity offers, and they know that nothing can 
 deprive them of these rewards, and also of a pension of 
 their full wages in case of old age or accident, unless 
 it be their own wilful and improper conduct. As to 
 the popularity of my service, I never yet attempted to 
 do an act of generosity or common justice, publicly or 
 privately, that I was not met by manifold reciprocity. 
 
 I regret that my friend Dr. Taylor should have so 
 suddenly called upon me to take part in this Associa- 
 tion, instead of giving me an opportunity to prepare 
 a document worthy of their acceptance ; but such as 
 this is, it is perfectly at their service, and with my best 
 wishes. 
 
 In reply to a question as to the number of persons in 
 his employment, Mr. Bianconi said that, before answer- 
 ing the question, he would illustrate his mode of manag- 
 ing the establishment. Any man found guilty of 
 uttering a falsehood, however venial, was instantly 
 dismissed ; and this, consequently, insured truth, accu- 
 racy, and punctuality. This being his fundamental 
 principle of management, he himself would not venture 
 on returning a positive answer to the question. They 
 could judge how many men were employed, when he 
 stated that there were 140 stations, and that each
 
 78 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 station had from one to six, or even eight, grooms ; 
 there were about 100 drivers, and about 1,300 horses. 
 The rate of travelling was from eight to nine miles 
 an hour, including stoppages ; and as for remunera- 
 tion, in proportion as he advanced one of his drivers, 
 he lowered his wages. This might seem wonderful, 
 but such was the fact. He advanced his driver by 
 placing him on a more lucrative line, where his cer- 
 tainty of receiving fees from the passengers was greater. 
 The drivers on the least paying roads received higher 
 wages, their fees being low. He said that he would have 
 referred more to the innate sense of morals common to 
 the people of Ireland, in order to exhibit how easy it 
 was for him to manage with facility and success such an 
 extended establishment, were he not afraid of English 
 criticism. He could not personally inspect each station, 
 a year would be employed in that alone, but he acted 
 to those he employed as he would wish them to act to- 
 wards him, he made them believe they were not his 
 slaves, but fellow-citizens, differing from him only in 
 gradation. He also made them feel that in doing their 
 work they conferred on him a greater benefit than he 
 did on them by payment of wages. He asserted, in 
 answer to a question put, that his cars had never once 
 been stopped, and that even in the time of the White- 
 boy insurrection, and when Kilkenny was disturbed, 
 though he had the carriage of a most important mail 
 the Dublin mail for a part of the road, he was never 
 interrupted; he repeatedly passed hundreds of the 
 people on the road at night and yet not one asked
 
 "THE BIANS." 79 
 
 him where he was going. This showed the high 
 bearing of the people, and the respect they had for the 
 laws of their country. 
 
 II. PAPER READ BY MR. BIANCONI AT THE DUBLIN 
 MEETING OF THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION FOR THE 
 ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE, August, 1857. 
 
 REFERRING to the synopsis of my establishment, sub- 
 mitted in a concise form to vour Association at its 
 
 / 
 
 session in Cork, in 1843, I now take the liberty of 
 submitting some further particulars, embracing its 
 origin, with its present condition, and the extent of 
 its operations. My establishment originated imme- 
 diately after the peace of 1815, having then had the 
 advantage of a supply of first- class horses intended for 
 the army, which I bought from ten to twenty pounds 
 apiece, one of which drew a car and six persons with 
 ease at the rate of seven miles an hour. The demand 
 for such horses having ceased, the breeding of them 
 naturally diminished, and, after some time, I found it 
 necessary to put two inferior horses to do the work of 
 one. Finding I thus had extra horse power, I increased 
 the size of the car which originally held six passengers, 
 three on each side, to one capable of carrying eight ; 
 and in proportion as the breed of horses improved, I 
 continued to increase the size of the cars for summer 
 work, and to add to the number of horses in winter, for 
 the conveyance of the same number of passengers, until 
 I converted the two-wheeled two-horse cars into four
 
 80 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 wheeled cars drawn by two, three, or four horses, 
 according to the traffic on the respective roads, and the 
 wants of the public. The freedom of communication 
 has greatly added to the elevation of the lower classes ; 
 for in proportion as they found that travelling on a 
 car with a saving of time, was cheaper than walking 
 with a loss of it, they began to appreciate the value of 
 speedy communication, and hence have been, to an 
 almost incalculable extent, travellers by my cars, 
 whereby they were enabled to mix with the better 
 orders of society, and their own moral elevation has 
 been of a decided character. As the establishment ex- 
 tended I was surprised and delighted at its commercial 
 and moral importance. I found, as soon as I had 
 opened communication with the interior of the country, 
 the consumption of manufactured goods greatly in- 
 creased. The facility for conveying goods enabled the 
 consumer to buy his wares more directly from the 
 manufacturer, and he consequently bought them cheaper 
 than when they had passed through the hands of many 
 retail dealers. For instance, in the more remote parts 
 of Ireland, before my cars ran from Tralee to Caherci- 
 veen in the south, from Galway to Clifden in the 
 west, and from Ballina to Belmullet in the north- 
 west, purchasers were obliged to give eight or nine 
 pence a yard for calico for shirts, which they afterwards 
 bought for three and four pence. The poor people, 
 therefore, who previously could ill afford to buy one 
 shirt, were enabled to buy two for a less price than they 
 had paid for one, and in the same ratio other commo-
 
 "THE BIANS." 81 
 
 clities came into general use at reduced prices. The 
 formation of my first car conveying passengers back to 
 back, on the principle of the outside car now so much 
 used in Dublin, was admirably adapted to its purposes, 
 and it frequently happened that, whilst on one side 
 were sitting some of the higher classes, the poorer 
 people would seat themselves on the other. Not only 
 was this unaccompanied with any inconvenience, but I 
 consider its effects were very salutary ; as many who 
 had no status were, by coming into communication 
 with the educated classes, inspired with the importance 
 of, and respect for, social position. The growth and 
 extent of railways necessarily affected my establishment 
 and diminished its operation, by withdrawing from it 
 ten two-wheeled cars, travelling daily 450 miles ; 
 twenty-two four-wheeled cars, travelling daily 1,620 
 miles; five coaches, travelling daily 376 miles, thus 
 making a total falling off of thirty-seven vehicles, 
 travelling daily 2,446 miles. Notwithstanding the 
 result of the extension of railways, I still have over 
 900 horses, working thirty-five two-wheeled cars, 
 travelling daily 1,752 miles ; twenty-two four-wheeled 
 cars, travelling daily 1,500 miles ; ten coaches, travel- 
 ling daily 992 miles, making in the whole sixty-seven 
 conveyances, travelling daily 4,244 miles, and extend- 
 ing over portions of twenty-two counties, viz : Cork, 
 Clare, Carlow, Cavan, Donegal, Fermanagh, Galway, 
 King's County, Kilkenny, Kerry, Limerick, Longford, 
 Leitrim, Mayo, Queen's County, Roscommon, Sligo, 
 Tipperary, Tyrone, "Waterford, Wexford, and West- 
 
 G
 
 82 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 meath. Anxious to aid as well as I could the resources 
 of the country, many of which lay so long unproduc- 
 tive, I endeavoured, as far as it was practicable, to effect 
 so desirable an object. For instance, I enabled the 
 fishermen on the western coast to avail themselves of a 
 rapid transit for their fresh fish, which, being a very 
 perishable article, would be comparatively profitless un- 
 less its conveyance to Dublin and other suitable markets 
 could be insured within a given time. So that those 
 engaged in the fisheries of Clifden, "Westport, and other 
 places, sending their produce by my conveyances on 
 one day, could rely on its reaching its destination the 
 following morning, additional horses and special con- 
 veyances being provided and put on in the proper 
 seasons. The amount realised by this valuable traffic 
 is almost incredible, and has, in my opinion, largely 
 contributed to the comfort and independence of the 
 people now so happily contrasting with the lament- 
 able condition of the west of Ireland a few years 
 since. I shall conclude with two observations, which, 
 I think, illustrate the increasing prosperity of the 
 country, and the progress of its inhabitants. First, 
 although the population has so considerably decreased 
 by emigration and other causes, the proportion of 
 travellers by my conveyances is greater, thus de- 
 monstrating that the people appreciate, not only the 
 money value of time, but also the advantages of an 
 establishment designed and worked for their particular 
 use and development, now forty-two years in operation. 
 Secondly, the peaceable and high moral bearing of the
 
 " THE BIANS." 83 
 
 Irish people, which can only be known and duly felt by 
 those who live amongst them, and who have had long 
 and constant intercourse with them. I have therefore 
 been equally surprised and pained to observe in portions 
 of the respectable press, both in England and Ireland, 
 repeated attacks on the morality of our population, 
 charging them with a proneness to violate the laws, and 
 with a disregard of private property. But as one plain 
 truth is worth a thousand bare assertions, I offer in con- 
 tradiction of those statements this indisputable fact : 
 My conveyances, many of them carrying very important 
 mails, have been travelling during all hours of the day 
 and night, often in lonely and unfrequented places, and 
 during t/te long period of forty -two years that my estab- 
 lishment is now in existence, the slightest injury has 
 never been done by the people to my property, or that 
 intrusted to my care; and this fact gives me greater 
 pleasure than any pride I might feel in reflecting upon 
 the other rewards of my life's labour. 
 
 III. PAPER READ BY MR. BIANCONI AT THE DUBLIN: 
 MEETING OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE 
 PROMOTION OF SOCIAL SCIENCE, August, 1861. 
 
 HAVING in 1843 and in 1857 presented to the British 
 Association, at the sessions in Cork and Dublin, a 
 synopsis of my establishment in Ireland, which was 
 received with a degree of interest to which I could 
 have scarcely deemed it entitled, I now venture for the 
 third, and perhaps the last time, to refer again to the
 
 84 CHAELES BIAKCONI. 
 
 subject, because I think it bears on the rise and pro- 
 gress of the social condition of this country. 
 
 In 1807-8 I was living at Carrick-on-Suir, distant 
 from Waterford, by road sixteen, and by the river Suir 
 about thirty miles ; and the only public mode of con- 
 veyance for passengers between these two places, 
 together containing a population of between thirty and 
 forty thousand inhabitants, was Tom Morrissy's boat, 
 which carried from eight to ten persons, and which, 
 besides being obliged to wait the tide, took from four 
 to five hours to perform the journey, at a fare of six- 
 pence halfpenny of the then currency. At the time 
 the railway opened, in 1853, there was between the 
 two towns horse-power capable of conveying by cars 
 and coaches one hundred passengers daily, performing 
 the journey in less than two hours, at a fare of two 
 shillings, thus showing that the people not only began 
 to understand the value of time, but also to appre- 
 ciate it. 
 
 However strange it may appear, I have always en- 
 tertained the belief that my having come to this 
 country without a knowledge of the language was of 
 advantage to me. I had more time for observation and 
 reflection, by which I was impressed with the great 
 want of such an establishment as I originated, and to 
 the formation of which two circumstances mainly con- 
 tributed. 
 
 Firstly, the tax on carriages, by which the middle 
 classes were precluded from using their own vehicles. 
 
 Secondly, the general peace that followed the battle
 
 "THE BIANS." 85 
 
 of Waterloo, and by which a great number of first- 
 class horses, bred for the army, were thrown on the 
 market with very little competition existing for their 
 purchase. 
 
 The family outside jaunting-car, thus expelled from 
 general use by a carriage-tax, suggested itself to me as 
 being admirably adapted for my purpose ; and I was 
 enabled to procure these vehicles on very moderate 
 terms. The state of the roads was such as to limit the 
 rate of travelling to about seveii miles an hour, and also 
 obliging the passengers to walk up the hills. Thus 
 all classes were brought together, and I have felt much 
 pleasure in believing that the intercourse thus created 
 tended to inspire the higher grades with respect and 
 regard for the natural good qualities of the humbler 
 people, which the latter reciprocated by a becoming 
 deference and an anxiety to please. Such a moral 
 benefit appears to me worthy of special notice and con- 
 gratulation. 
 
 At the commencement of my establishment in 1815, 
 which was principally confined for several years to the 
 south of Ireland, the conveyance of the cross mails was 
 confided to local postmasters, who generally farmed 
 them out, and the duty was performed by men who 
 rode on horseback, or else walked. On the 6th of July 
 1815, I had the pleasure of being the first to establish 
 the conveyance of the cross mails by cars, having un- 
 dertaken to carry the Cahir and Clonmel mail for the 
 postmaster of Cahir, for half the amount he was him- 
 self paid for sending it, by a mule and a bad horse alter-
 
 86 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 nately. I subsequently became a contractor for the 
 conveyance of several cross mails at a price not exceed- 
 ing half the amount the Government had paid the post- 
 masters for doing this duty ; and it was not until Lord 
 O'Neill and Lord Ross ceased to be Postmasters- 
 General of Ireland, and that the Duke of Richmond 
 became the Postmaster-General of the United Kingdom, 
 under the Government of Lord Grey, and that the 
 local postmasters were no longer appointed exclusively 
 from one section of the community, that the convey- 
 ance of all the cross mails was set up to public com- 
 petition, to be carried on the principle of my establish- 
 ment. It is impossible to over-estimate the advantage 
 derived by the public from this change ; for the local 
 postmasters, who dared not report their regularity of 
 their own contractors in the performance of their duty, 
 became extremely strict in seeing that the new con- 
 tractors performed their duties regularly, and by this 
 new system the public received their letters upon an 
 average of nearly thirty per cent, saving of time. 
 
 As railways may now be said to be the great civi- 
 lisers of the age, by bringing people into communica- 
 tion, who, but for the facilities of travelling, would be 
 unknown to each other, so my cars, at an earlier period, 
 opened between different parts of Ireland an inter- 
 course which had not previously existed. 
 
 Notwithstanding the inroads made on my establish- 
 ment by the railways, and which displaced over 1,000 
 horses, and obliged me to direct my attention to such 
 portions of the country as had not before the benefit o f
 
 <C THE BIANS." 87 
 
 my conveyances, it still employs about 900 horses, tra- 
 velling over 4,000 miles daily, passing through twenty- 
 three counties, having 137 stations, and working twelve 
 mail and day coaches 672 miles; fifty four-wheeled 
 cars, with two and more horses, travelling 1,930 miles ; 
 and sixty-six two-wheeled one-horse cars, travelling 
 1,604 miles. 
 
 The commencement of my car establishment in the 
 county of Tipper ary, in the year 1815, was a matter of 
 great surprise to many, as at that time the country was 
 much disorganized, owing principally to the maladmi- 
 nistration of the laws, and to the almost total severance 
 of the bond which ought to have united the upper and 
 humbler classes of society. This sad state of things 
 was afterwards improved by the efforts made to obtain 
 Catholic Emancipation, which the people were taught 
 to believe could only be obtained by obedience to the 
 laws and by self-reliance, both of which were respected 
 by the increasing liberality of public opinion. 
 
 The benefits conferred by the establishment of petty 
 sessions cannot be over-estimated; they soon proved 
 most salutary in inspiring the people with respect for 
 the law ; for as power was deputed to these local courts 
 from the quarter sessions, and to the latter from the 
 superior courts, not only was confidence in the adminis- 
 tration of justice strengthened and more diffused, but 
 the evil of consigning great numbers untried from one 
 assizes to another, to the demoralizing influence of the 
 gaol, thereby exposing those who might be innocent 
 to certain degradation, and rendering the guilty more
 
 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 depraved, was in a great degree obviated. Nor can I 
 avoid reference to the visible effects produced by educa- 
 tion and the Reformatory movement, so admirably cal- 
 culated to check crime in its infancy, and to restore to 
 society those who would, under the old system, have 
 crowded the public prisons, have been lost to them- 
 selves, and have become a curse to the community. 
 I have ever regarded the impartial and regular dis- 
 charge of the duties at petty sessions as one of the 
 most useful aids in tranquillising the country and im- 
 proving the habits of the people, which, in Ireland, I 
 rejoice to say, can now bear comparison with those of 
 any other nation. 
 
 I shall conclude with a hope that the Social Science 
 Association may often receive a deserved welcome in 
 this my adopted country, and that on each recurring 
 visit, it will have to place on its records satisfactory 
 proofs of the moral, intellectual, and physical progress 
 of Ireland. 
 
 IV. PAPER READ BY DR. NEILSON HANCOCK AT THE 
 BELFAST MEETING OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION 
 FOR THE PROMOTION OF SOCIAL SCIENCE, 1867. 
 
 AT several meetings of the British Association for the 
 Advancement of Science, and the National Association 
 for the Promotion of Social Science in Ireland, Mr. 
 Bianconi has attended, and has given some Statistics of 
 the progress of his enterprise. He has unfortunately 
 been prevented in this instance by an accident from
 
 "THE BIANS." 89 
 
 * 
 
 being present,* but has placed the Statistics up to the 
 period of his retiring from business in my hands, and I 
 have embodied the results in the following paper. 
 
 Doubts are frequently expressed aa to whether the 
 scarcity of manufactures in the south and west of Ire- 
 land arises from the absence of coal and iron, or from 
 some defect in the people which mars enterprise, how- 
 ever well conceived or well planned. 
 
 For the solution of such a question, the most import- 
 ant that can occupy a Social Science Congress in Ire- 
 land, a good test to apply would be the observation of 
 some enterprise conducted on the same principle in dif- 
 ferent parts of Ireland, conducted too on a sufficiently 
 large scale, or for a sufficient length of time, to afford 
 satisfactory evidence of its success or failure. 
 
 Now, the statistics of such an enterprise have been 
 placed in my hands. I have examined them, and I 
 propose to submit to this department the results of that 
 examination. 
 
 Mr. Bianconi, the great coach and car proprietor, 
 has recently handed over to his agents on very liberal 
 terms the different lines he was working. 
 
 He commenced operations as a car proprietor in 
 1815, and after the lapse of half a century, has retired 
 from a thriving and prosperous business, having at the 
 time he retired a traffic extending over 2,506 miles 
 worked daily. 
 
 * Mr. Bianconi broke his thigh on the oth October, 1866, and has 
 consequently been confined to his room for the greater part of the past 
 year, during which he was obliged to retire from business altogether.
 
 90 CHARLES BIANCOXI. 
 
 The regular progress by which the traffic was pro- 
 duced, is indicated by the following figures : 
 
 Established. Miles Worked Daily. 
 
 1815 to 1825 .. . .. 1,170 
 
 1826 to 1835 . . , , 1,064 
 
 1836 to 1845 . . . . 1,032 
 
 Established before Railways. 3,266 
 
 1846 to 1855 . . . . ., . 2,656 
 
 1856 to 1865 . . 938 
 
 Established since Railways . 3,594 
 
 Total Established . 6,860 
 
 It might be expected that railways would injure if 
 not overthrow the traffic, but in the enterprising hands 
 of Mr. Bianconi it only changed its direction. 
 
 The judgment with which the earlier lines were 
 planned, is shown by the small number discontinued 
 before the introduction of railways. 
 
 Lines Discontinued. Miles Worked. 
 
 1815 to 1825 . . . . Nil. 
 
 1826 to 1835 . . . Nil. 
 
 1836 to 1845 . , . . 76 
 
 Discontinued before Railways . 76 
 
 1846 to 1855 . " . . . 2,214 
 
 1856 to 1865 ... 2,064 
 
 Discontinued since Railways . 4,278 
 
 Total Discontinued . . 4,354 
 
 If we deduct the total number of miles discontinued 
 (4,354) from the total number ever established (6,860), 
 we get 2,506, the number of miles in 1865, which is
 
 "THE BIANS." 91 
 
 only 684 below the maximum number (3,190) in 1845, 
 before railways interfered with the traffic. 
 
 The next matter to notice is the character of the 
 traffic. 
 
 Mr. Bianconi' s great idea was that we never should 
 despise poor people, or apparently small interests. His 
 great enterprise arose from the problems : how to 
 make a two-wheeled car pay while running for the 
 accommodation of poor districts and poor people, as 
 regularly as the mail coaches did for the rich ; and 
 when that was solved, how to regulate a system of 
 traffic by a network of cars, the cars increasing in size 
 as the traffic required, from the short two-horse car 
 holding six people, to the long four-horse car holding 
 twenty people. 
 
 His use of stage coaches arose altogether from the 
 mail contracts, and not from any want of confidence 
 in the car system. To the last Mr. Bianconi never 
 despised the two-wheeled car, for to this he owed his 
 fortune. 
 
 The traffic amongst the conveyances is thus dis- 
 tributed : 
 
 Miles ever Worked. Final Traffic. 
 Two Wheels . . 1,286 802 
 
 Four Wheels . . 3,988 1,396 
 
 Coaches . . . 1,586 308 
 
 Total . , . 6,860 2,506 
 
 The extent of Ireland over which the traffic was dif- 
 fused when Mr. Bianconi retired, may be judged by 
 the fact that we find his conveyances at Dungarvan,
 
 92 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 Waterford, and Wexford, on the east coast ; at Tralee, 
 Galway, Clifden, Westport, and Belmullet, in the 
 west ; at Bandon, Rosscarbery, Skibbereen, and Caher- 
 civeen, in the south ; and at Sligo, Enniskillen, Stra- 
 bane, and Letterkenny, in the north ; whilst in the 
 centre of Ireland we find the towns of Clonmel, Thurles, 
 Kilkenny, Birr, and Ballinasloe. 
 
 The history of Mr. Bianconi's establishment dis- 
 closes some interesting results in Social Science. It 
 appears that he organized his establishment on a 
 system of promotion and pensions rarely adopted 
 except in public departments. His drivers, being 
 taken from the lowest grade of the establishment, and 
 progressively advanced according to their respective 
 merits as opportunities offered, were allowed to retire 
 on pensions either from old age, incapacity, or sickness, 
 and the orphan children of the grooms and others were 
 educated by him, and afterwards filled the situation of 
 their deceased parents. 
 
 The great experience of Mr. Bianconi from the dura- 
 tion of his undertaking, and the extent of the country 
 over which it extended, makes his testimony as to the 
 conduct of the people towards himself most valuable. 
 He has informed me that he could repeat now what he 
 said at the British Association in 1857 : 
 
 "My conveyances, many of them carrying very important mails, 
 have been travelling during all hours of the day and night, often in 
 lonely and unfrequented places, and during the long period of forty- 
 two years (now fifty-two, in 1867) that my establishment is now in 
 existence, the slightest injury has never been done by the people to 
 my property, or that intrusted to my care ; and this fact gives me
 
 "THE BIANS." 93 
 
 greater pleasure than any pride I might feel in reflecting upon the 
 other rewards of my life's lahour." 
 
 He wishes, too, to repeat what he said at the British 
 Association in Cork, in 1843 : 
 
 " That he never yet attempted to do an act of generosity or 
 common justice, publicly or privately, that he was not met by mani- 
 fold reciprocity." 
 
 The Official Statistics of Crime corroborate Mr. 
 Bianconi's evidence as to the suggestive absence of 
 crime connected with opposition to trade or manufacture 
 in Ireland. 
 
 Mr. Bianconi has now retired from active life at the 
 age of eighty, after a long and honourable career. He 
 came to this country a young foreigner in 1802. He 
 commenced his great enterprise in 1815, and he suffered 
 from the legal disabilities then imposed on foreigners. 
 The support of Sir Robert Peel, when Home Secretary, 
 was unable to secxire him letters of naturalisation when 
 he first applied for them to the Privy Council in Ireland, 
 and it was not until he had been resident in Ireland 
 for twenty-nine years, that in 1831 this recognition of 
 citizenship was at length granted, during the adminis- 
 tration of Earl Grey, his application being supported 
 by the Grand Jury of Tipperary, where he resided. 
 
 His history, I think, shows that foreigners may suc- 
 ceed in Ireland as well as natives. 
 
 We may congratulate Mr. Bianconi on his retirement 
 in having truly served his adopted country, not only 
 by the great system of traffic which he organized and 
 developed, but on his having afforded the strongest
 
 94 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 proof that there is nothing in the character of the 
 inhabitants of the most Celtic districts in Ireland to 
 prevent the success of any enterprise, however exten- 
 sive, which is conducted with such energy, ability, 
 good feeling, and sound sense as he has displayed. 
 
 He has shown, too, that we must look for the causes 
 of the scanty development of manufactures in the south 
 and west of Ireland to the want of coal and iron and 
 flax, and to the absence of the advantages which the 
 long possession of the facilities for obtaining these has 
 given to more favoured countries, rather than to the 
 theories hitherto prevalent about the unsuitabilities of 
 the Irish people for such labour:
 
 STATISTICS OF LINES ESTABLISHED. 
 
 
 8 
 
 g| 
 
 it 
 
 1 
 
 a 
 
 
 LINES ESTABLISHED. 
 
 1 
 
 "M 
 
 ss 
 
 Is 
 
 S * 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 
 "S-S 
 
 fig 
 
 *J 
 
 t 
 
 1 
 
 o 
 
 Clonmel and Limerick 
 
 50 
 
 1815 
 
 100 
 
 
 100 
 
 
 Clonmel and Thurles 
 
 31 
 
 1815 
 
 62 
 
 
 62 
 
 
 Clonmel iind Waterford, 10 o'clock 
 
 82 
 
 1816 
 
 64 
 
 
 64 
 
 
 Waterford and Ross 
 
 15 
 
 1818 
 
 30 
 
 
 80 
 
 
 Waterford and Wexford 
 
 40 
 
 1819 
 
 80 
 
 
 80 
 
 
 Waterford and Enniscorthy 
 
 86 
 
 1819 
 
 72 
 
 
 72 
 
 
 Clonmel and Waterford (Regulator) 
 Clonmel and Waterford (Telegraph) ... 
 Clonmel and Cork 
 
 32 
 32 
 65 
 
 1820 
 1821 
 1821 
 
 64 
 64 
 130 
 
 
 '64 
 130 
 
 "64 
 
 Clonmel and Kilkenny 
 Kilkenny and Waterford 
 
 33 
 32 
 
 1821 
 1822 
 
 66 
 
 64 
 
 
 66 
 64 
 
 
 Clonmel and Thui lea 
 
 31 
 
 1822 
 
 62 
 
 
 62 
 
 
 Thurles and Kilkenny 
 
 31 
 
 1822 
 
 62 
 
 "62 
 
 
 
 Roscrea and Portumna 
 
 28 
 
 1822 
 
 66 
 
 56 
 
 
 
 Tipperary and Cashe) 
 
 13 
 
 1824 
 
 26 
 
 
 "26 
 
 
 Waterford and Dungarvan 
 Dungarvan and Lismore ... 
 
 28 
 16 
 
 1824 
 1824 
 
 66 
 
 32 
 
 '82 
 
 
 '56 
 
 Wexford Mail 
 
 40 
 
 1S25 
 
 80 
 
 
 'so 
 
 
 Total 
 
 585 
 
 
 1,170 
 
 150 
 
 900 
 
 120 
 
 Thnrles and Roscrea 
 
 23 
 
 1826 
 
 46 
 
 
 46 
 
 
 Tipperary and Clonmel, 3 o'clock 
 
 80 
 
 1828 
 
 60 
 
 
 60 
 
 
 Tipperary and Clonmel Night Mail 
 Limerick and Cork 
 
 30 
 40 
 
 1828 
 1830 
 
 60 
 80 
 
 "60 
 
 'so 
 
 
 Clonmel and Dungarvan 
 
 26 
 
 1831 
 
 52 
 
 
 62 
 
 
 Ath) one and Longford 
 
 24 
 
 1831 
 
 48 
 
 '48 
 
 
 
 Waterford and Kilkenny 
 Birr and Ballinasloe 
 
 32 
 26 
 
 1831 
 1831 
 
 64 
 52 
 
 "52 
 
 '64 
 
 
 Sligo and Longford 
 
 66 
 
 1832 
 
 112 
 
 
 112 
 
 
 Limerick and Tralee Car 
 
 62 
 
 1833 
 
 124 
 
 
 124 
 
 
 Limerick and Tralee Coach 
 
 60 
 
 1833 
 
 120 
 
 
 
 120 
 
 Ross and Carlow 
 
 22 
 
 1833 
 
 44 
 
 
 '44 
 
 
 Limerick and Galway 
 
 64 
 
 1834 
 
 128 
 
 
 
 128 
 
 Kilkenny and Mountmellick 
 
 37 
 
 1835 
 
 74 
 
 
 74 
 
 
 Total 
 
 532 
 
 
 1,064 
 
 160 
 
 666 
 
 248 
 
 Killarney and Caherciveen 
 
 37 
 
 1836 
 
 74 
 
 74 
 
 
 
 Tralee and Caherciveen 
 
 16 
 
 1836 
 
 32 
 
 32 
 
 
 
 Ballinasloe and Westport 
 Ballinasloe and Galway 
 Mitchelstown and MaUow 
 
 75 
 34 
 21 
 
 1836 
 1836 
 1837 
 
 150 
 68 
 42 
 
 
 150 
 68 
 42 
 
 
 Longford and Castlerea 
 
 27 
 
 1837 
 
 64 
 
 
 
 "54 
 
 Galway and Clifden, 9 -30 o'clock 
 
 50 
 
 1837 
 
 100 
 
 
 ibo 
 
 
 Limerick and Killarney 
 Ballinasloe and Athlone 
 
 15 
 
 15 
 
 1839 
 1839 
 
 30 
 30 
 
 
 30 
 80 
 
 
 Ross and Fethard 
 
 20 
 
 1840 
 
 40 
 
 '40 
 
 
 
 Longford and Ballina 
 
 71 
 
 1840 
 
 142 
 
 
 i42 
 
 
 Clonmel and Roscrea 
 
 56 
 
 1842 
 
 112 
 
 
 112 
 
 
 Ennis and Ballinasloe 
 
 38 
 
 1844 
 
 76 
 
 
 76 
 
 
 Ballina and Belmullet .'." 
 
 41 
 
 1844 
 
 82 
 
 
 82 
 
 
 Total 
 
 516 
 
 
 1,032 
 
 146 
 
 832 
 
 54 
 
 Total before Railways 
 
 1,633 
 
 
 3,266 
 
 456 
 
 2,388 
 
 422 
 
 * The lines upon which four-wheeled cars came to be used are so classed, though 
 in many cases they were commenced with two-wheeled cars.
 
 STATISTICS OF LIXES ESTABLISHED. 
 
 LIKES ESTABLISHED. 
 
 I 
 
 Date when 
 Established. 
 
 No. of Miles 
 Worked Daily. 
 
 3 
 
 Id 
 
 f s 
 
 fa 
 
 Four-wheeled 
 Cars. 
 
 Coaches. 
 
 Mnllingar and Longford 
 Westport Mail 
 
 26 
 62 
 
 1848 
 1849 
 
 52 
 124 
 
 
 52 
 
 124 
 
 Mullmgar and Sligo Mail 
 Mullingar and Sligo Day 
 Mullingar and Galway Mail 
 Mullingar and Galway Day 
 Mulliugar and Carrick-on-Shannon 
 Waterford and Gooldscross 
 Templemore and Athlone ... 
 Clonmel and GooldscToss 
 Cionmel and Gooldscross Coach 
 Gooldscross and Cashel, 6 o'clock 
 
 82 
 82 
 70 
 70 
 50 
 51 
 51 
 21 
 21 
 6 
 70 
 
 1849 
 1849 
 1849 
 1849 
 1849 
 1849 
 1849 
 1849 
 1849 
 1849 
 1851 
 
 164 
 164 
 140 
 140 
 100 
 102 
 102 
 42 
 42 
 12 
 140 
 
 ibz 
 '42 
 "12 
 
 lo'i' 
 
 164 
 164 
 140 
 140 
 100 
 
 42 
 
 140 
 
 
 50 
 
 1851 
 
 100 
 
 
 100 
 
 
 Athlone and Roscommon 
 Galway and Westport 
 Limerick and Tipperary 
 Galway and Clif den Mail 
 Limerick and Ennis Mail 
 
 19 
 52 
 23 
 50 
 22 
 71 
 
 1851 
 1851 
 1851 
 iail 
 1852 
 1852 
 
 38 
 104 
 46 
 100 
 44 
 142 
 
 ibo 
 
 38 
 
 44 
 142 
 
 104 
 46 
 
 Sligo and Enniskillen 
 Sligo and Westport .. 
 
 30 
 62 
 
 1852 
 1852 
 
 60 
 124 
 
 
 60 
 124 
 
 
 Taum and Claremorris Day 
 Tuam and Claremorris Mail 
 Kilkenny and Dnrrow 
 Athenry and Westport 
 Waterford and Maryborough 
 Limerick and Ennis Day 
 Killarney and Mallow 
 Tralee and Mallow 
 
 17 
 17 
 16 
 61 
 62 
 22 
 41 
 51 
 
 1852 
 1853 
 1853 
 1853 
 1853 
 1851 
 1854 
 1854 
 
 34 
 34 
 32 
 122 
 124 
 44 
 82 
 102 
 
 34 
 34 
 
 '82 
 
 '32 
 122 
 124 
 44 
 
 102 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Total 
 
 1,328 
 
 
 2,656 
 
 406 
 
 1,086 
 
 1,164 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Westport and Newport 
 Strabane and Lerterkenny 
 Bandon and SMbbereen Mail 
 Bandon and Rosscarbery 
 Ballinasloe and Ballybrophy 
 Ennis and Oranmore 
 Enniskillen and Omagh 
 Enniskillen and Bundoran 
 Tuam and Dunmore 
 Castlebar and Ballina 
 Kilkenny and UrUngford 
 Waterford and Passage, 6 o'clock ., 
 Waterford and Passage, 3 o'clock 
 C istlerea and Ballina 
 Westport and Swinford 
 Letterkenny and Strabane 
 Ross and Wexford 
 
 8 
 15 
 33 
 20 
 48 
 36 
 64 
 30 
 10 
 26 
 16 
 8 
 8 
 43 
 27 
 15 
 25 
 
 1857 
 1857 
 1857 
 1857 
 1858 
 1859 
 1860 
 1861 
 1861 
 1862 
 1862 
 1863 
 1863 
 1864 
 1864 
 1864 
 1864 
 
 16 
 30 
 66 
 40 
 96 
 72 
 128 
 60 
 220 
 52 
 32 
 16 
 16 
 86 
 54 
 30 
 50 
 
 16 
 30 
 
 96 
 72 
 
 220 
 
 "86 
 54 
 
 50 
 
 '66 
 40 
 
 128 
 60 
 
 '52 
 32 
 16 
 16 
 
 'SO 
 
 
 Killarney and Caherciveen 
 
 37 
 
 1865 
 
 74 
 
 
 74 
 
 
 Total 
 
 469 
 
 
 938 
 
 424 
 
 514 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Total after Railways 
 Total before Railways 
 
 1,797 
 1,633 
 
 
 3,594 
 3,266 
 
 830 
 456 
 
 1,600 
 2,388 
 
 1,164 
 422 
 
 General Total 
 
 3,430 
 
 
 6,860 
 
 1,286 
 
 3,988 
 
 1,586
 
 STATISTICS OF LINES DISCONTINUED. 
 
 LIVES DracoNTOfUKD. 
 
 Date when 
 Discontinued. 
 
 No. of Miles 
 Worked Daily. 
 
 a 
 1 
 
 H 
 || 
 
 2 
 
 
 
 l 
 o 
 
 m 
 
 w 
 O 
 
 
 1836 
 1842 
 
 30 
 46 
 
 
 30 
 46 
 
 76 
 
 
 
 Total before Bailways 
 
 
 76 
 
 
 
 1846 
 I^i7 
 1849 
 1849 
 IMS 
 1849 
 1849 
 1849 
 1851 
 1851 
 1851 
 1851 
 1852 
 1852 
 1852 
 1-.VJ 
 1852 
 1853 
 1853 
 1853 
 1853 
 1853 
 1853 
 1853 
 1853 
 1853 
 1854 
 1855 
 
 ifioa 
 
 1857 
 1857 
 1858 
 1859 
 1859 
 1859 
 1860 
 1861 
 1861 
 1861 
 1861 
 1861 
 1862 
 1862 
 1862 
 1862 
 1863 
 1864 
 1864 
 1865 
 1865 
 1865 
 1865 
 
 80 
 26 
 100 
 t;-j 
 60 
 80 
 112 
 76 
 64 
 54 
 30 
 142 
 60 
 74 
 140 
 140 
 42 
 64 
 64 
 64 
 130 
 64 
 120 
 150 
 68 
 30 
 66 
 52 
 40 
 56 
 102 
 42 
 140 
 38 
 44 
 44 
 112 
 100 
 104 
 46 
 122 
 164 
 164 
 102 
 124 
 100 
 82 
 102 
 48 
 82 
 96 
 60 
 
 "eo 
 
 40 
 
 56 
 
 102 
 
 82 
 "48 
 96 
 
 80 
 26 
 100 
 62 
 
 "so 
 
 112 
 76 
 64 
 
 "so 
 
 142 
 60 
 74 
 
 "64 
 
 '64 
 130 
 64 
 
 150 
 68 
 30 
 66 
 52 
 
 102 
 42 
 
 "38 
 44 
 44 
 112 
 100 
 
 122 
 
 124 
 
 103 
 32 
 60 
 
 2,516 
 76 
 
 '54 
 
 140 
 
 140 
 42 
 
 '64 
 120 
 
 140 
 
 104 
 46 
 
 164 
 164 
 
 ioo 
 
 
 
 Clonmel and Thurles 
 Tipperary and Clonmel Night Mail 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Tipperary and Clonmel, 3 o'clock 
 Kilkenny and Mountmellick 
 Mullingar and Galway Mail 
 
 Clonmel and Gooldscross Coach 
 Clonmel and Waterford, 10 o'clock 
 Clonmel and Waterford Regulator 
 Clonmel and Waterford Telegraph 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Waterford and Maryborough 
 Mullingar and Carrick-on- Shannon 
 
 Tralee and Mallow ... 
 
 Athlone and Longford 
 
 Kilkenny and Dturow 
 
 Ballinasloe and Ballybrophy 
 Knnislrillpn and Riipfjnran . 
 
 Total after Railways... 
 Total before Railways 
 
 General Total 
 
 
 4,278 
 76 
 
 484 
 
 1,278 
 
 
 4,354 
 
 484 2,592 1,278 
 
 
 11
 
 STATISTICS OF FINAL TRAFFIC. 
 
 FINAL TRAFFIC. 
 
 Date when 
 Established. 
 
 No. of Miles 
 Worked Daily. 
 
 Two-wheeled 
 Cars. 
 
 Four-wheeled 
 
 Cars. 
 
 00 
 
 1 
 1 
 
 
 1819 
 1819 
 1822 
 1822 
 1824 
 1824 
 
 80 
 72 
 62 
 62 
 56 
 32 
 
 62 
 82 
 
 80 
 72 
 62 
 
 56 
 66 
 
 128 
 
 Waterford and Emmcorthy 
 
 
 
 11 (\ T ' IOTP 
 
 Total 
 
 
 364 
 
 94 
 
 214 
 
 
 1831 
 1831 
 1833 
 1834 
 
 52 
 52 
 124 
 128 
 
 62 
 
 52 
 124 
 
 
 
 
 Total 
 
 
 356 
 
 52 
 
 176 
 
 128 
 
 
 1836 
 1836 
 1837 
 1844 
 
 74 
 32 
 100 
 82 
 
 74 
 32 
 
 100 
 82 
 
 __!_ 
 
 
 Galway and Clifden, 9.30 o'clock 
 
 Total . 
 
 
 288 
 
 106 
 
 182 
 
 Total before Kailways 
 
 
 1,008 
 
 252 
 
 572 
 
 184 
 
 1849 
 1849 
 1849 
 1851 
 1852 
 1852 
 1852 
 1852 
 1852 
 iv.-,i 
 
 124 
 42 
 12 
 100 
 44 
 142 
 60 
 124 
 34 
 34 
 
 42 
 12 
 100 
 
 34 
 34 
 
 "44 
 142 
 60 
 124 
 
 370 
 
 124 
 
 
 Gooldscroes and Cashel, 6 o'clock 
 Galwav and Clifden Mail ... 
 
 
 
 
 
 Tuam and Claremorris Day 
 Taam and Claremorris Meal 
 
 Total 
 
 
 716 
 
 222 
 
 124 
 
 
 1857 
 1867 
 1857 
 1857 
 1859 
 1860 
 1861 
 1862 
 1862 
 1863 
 1863 
 1864 
 1864 
 1864 
 1864 
 1865 
 
 16 
 30 
 66 
 40 
 72 
 128 
 20 
 52 
 32 
 16 
 16 
 86 
 64 
 30 
 50 
 74 
 
 16 
 30 
 
 "72 
 20 
 
 86 
 
 54 
 
 'SO 
 
 "(56 
 40 
 
 128 
 
 62 
 32 
 16 
 16 
 
 "so 
 
 "74 
 
 
 
 Bandon and Skibbereen 
 
 
 Ennis and Oranmore .. 
 
 "F.HTiistillen and Otnagh 
 
 Tuam and Dunmore 
 
 Castlebar and Ballina 
 
 Kilkenny and Urlingford ... 
 
 Waterford and Passage, 6 o'clock 
 Waterford and Passage, 3 o'clock 
 Castlerea and Ballina 
 
 Westport and Swinford 
 
 Letteikenny and Strabane .. 
 
 Ross and Wexford 
 
 Killarney nnd f!ahprp.iv*n 
 
 Total ... 
 
 
 782 
 
 328 
 
 454 
 
 
 Total after Railways 
 Total before Railways 
 
 General Total 
 
 
 1,498 
 1,008 
 
 550 
 252 
 
 824 
 572 
 
 124 
 184 
 
 
 2,506 
 
 802 ; 1,396 
 
 308 

 
 "THE BIA.NS." 99 
 
 I will conclude this chapter with some extracts from 
 my father's Bian correspondence. I found two tin 
 cases full of his letters (the deciphering of which cost 
 his last clerk and me three months' hard labour) 
 written during our three years' sojourn abroad, when 
 my father spent at least the half of each year with his 
 dying daughter. Nothing ever gave me a better idea 
 of his extraordinary power of minute detail and com- 
 prehensive schemes. To get the full value out of his 
 postage-stamp he wrote letters of more than double the 
 length of those he usually wrote when at home ; and 
 though these letters extend only over a period of three 
 years, what he says about the Bian establishment would 
 apply equally well to any other time. 
 
 He had instructed his agents Mr. Hearn, Mr. Carri- 
 gan, and Mr. O'Leary to hold a congress at stated 
 periods, in his absence ; and his letters, though usually 
 addressed to Mr. O'Leary, were meant to be shown to 
 his two colleagues. 
 
 " I hope that your having only twenty-six barrels of 
 " oats at Clifden, in place of thirty or forty barrels, 
 " may be a clerical mistake, as there can be no excuse 
 " for so serious a deficiency. How do you account for 
 " Mr. Hearn's liberality to Mr. Feeny ? He ought to 
 " have bought his old screws for 8 or 10 apiece. 
 " As for cars, we are swamped with machinery all over 
 " the country that will never yield us anything. Your 
 
 " index for March is very good In reference 
 
 " to the pump at Gooldscross you and Mr. Hearn are 
 " wrong, as I intend to have a force-pump against the
 
 100 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " wall, and a lead-pipe down from that into the well. 
 " When next you see our respected friend, Father 
 " Kirwan, P.P., tell him that he had a great loss in 
 " not seeing the world's sight in the extraordinary con- 
 " gregation lately assembled in the Exhibition, and we 
 " hope he will not forget his promise of calling at 
 " Longfield. I fear that, from the weakness of my 
 " daughter's health, I shall be delayed here until Mon- 
 
 " day While Messrs. Hearn and Carrigan are 
 
 " with you, impress on Mr. Carrigan the necessity of 
 " dividing the stations into districts, and then appoint 
 " one from among the travelling staff to each district, 
 " and in no time they will have our stock complete. 
 " On no account allow any agent to buy even one 
 " barrel of oats, as I have before so frequently ex- 
 " plained. In the face of this I find Mr. Carrigan 
 
 " dashing off cash to them By all means go 
 
 " fully into the charge of immorality against F ; 
 
 " if guilty, he must be forthwith dismissed, and no 
 " quarter given. Mr. Hughes is to take his place. 
 " Be sure no quarters are given to any one found in 
 ' ' the least out of order, either in honesty or discipline. 
 " Rely on it we are greatly to blame for allowing the 
 " whole of the north and the north-western districts to 
 '' run wild, as we have done for the want of one or 
 " two commissioners being sent amongst them. I have 
 " the greatest confidence in Mr. Carrigan's honesty and 
 
 " zeal, but none at all in his craft 
 
 " Mr. Carrigan must turn his attention seriously to 
 " what I believe has escaped us all in his district : the
 
 "THE BIAXS." 101 
 
 " care of washing and oiling the respective cars and 
 " coaches by the respective drivers ; and he shall be 
 " held responsible for the cars in his district. From 
 " the state of the badly worn-out arms of axles we 
 " lately had to replace in these districts, I am only sur- 
 " prised how our horses were able to move along with 
 " them ; therefore let you all look sharp at this, and make 
 " a general rout about it, to agents, drivers, &c 
 
 " When next you see Mr. Hearn and Mr. Carrigan 
 " you must make arrangements to put a proper person 
 
 " to travel for us in place of , who is known to 
 
 " everybody ; otherwise all our men, particularly those 
 " far west, will become demoralised. This is most 
 " essential, and it must be looked to at once. Do you 
 " compare the secret report with the way-bills ? If so, 
 " why don't you say something ? In reference to Mr. 
 " Cusack and Mr. Connell, and the keeping of the 
 " accounts, I shall be satisfied with any arrangement 
 " your congress may come to 
 
 " I am indignant at the humbugging of Sim Ryan, 
 " who knew how badly he was wanted at Bagnalstown 
 " as well as in the west, and who frittered away his 
 " time wantonly at Kilkenny and at Carlow. "Write to 
 " Mr. Hearn at Callan, saying that we take the ten tons 
 " of hay at his price 21s. per ton and he shall have 
 " the Kilkenny price for his oats, which he may com- 
 " mence issuing from and after the first of next month. 
 " And be sure you write a conciliatory letter to him to 
 " make amends for the improper conduct of Mr. Ryan 
 " towards so respectable a man
 
 102 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " Why did not the train stop a few minutes for our 
 " % coach on the 30th ult. ? See the agent at Goolds- 
 " cross about this ; that's not the way we would treat 
 " them. Your unpaid letter of 13th has cost me more 
 " than if you had prepaid it 
 
 " Credit Post-office cross mileage 730 17s. 8d. ; 
 " direct mileage, 1,188 2s. Qd., and which is falling 
 " off 519 8*. Qd. since last quarter, and will soon be 
 " about 500 less than the past quarter, so much for 
 " railroad economy. Credit Grand Canal 83 6*. 8</., 
 " being two months' boating, the last of our contract 
 " after a connection of nearly twenty years on the most 
 " honourable and best understanding. Debit Dublin 
 " Bank for these sums which will be paid them by next 
 " Saturday. Credit Dublin Bank 600. Debit Mr. T. 
 " Hayes, of Dublin. Credit Dublin Bank 475, and 
 " Mr. T. Hayes 40. Debit, nurse 17 10s. Od. in fuU 
 " of all wages due " 
 
 Here is another point on which he laid great 
 stress : 
 
 " I am much alarmed at finding in the index some 
 " of the cars transposed from one number to another, 
 " which must have the effect of falsifying the general 
 " car-book, and specially my statistics of 1851 " 
 
 My father attached great importance to his guards, 
 and here he speaks of John O'Mahony, one of his 
 favourites : 
 
 " I hope John O'Mahony has been put upon higher 
 " wages, and on a proper line, as much depends upon 
 " the guards. I fear they are not sufficiently interested
 
 "THE BIANS." 103 
 
 " for us, nor of the class we ought to get, as they rob 
 " us with impunity when the agents are too slothful to 
 " get up at night to see after their business. I wrote 
 
 " twice to put an agent at Tuam in place of , if he 
 
 " did not attend better 
 
 " We ought to take up the Tralee coach ; and ask 
 " Mr. Hearn what we should do about the Dingle one. 
 " Suppose we make the first from Ballina to Sligo for 
 " fish at Id. per Ib. ; it may be small, but still worthy 
 " of our consideration. But they should pay us at 
 " Ballina, and give us no trouble after 
 
 " I am glad to see from your letter that you are 
 " greatly improved in business in the back office. I 
 " am glad you did so well in the oats account. You 
 " ought to open a banking account by Mr. Hearn 
 " giving you an account every week or ten days of all 
 " the cheques he draws, and see that the agents give 
 " credit for these regularly, which will also add to the 
 " facility and care of the oats account 
 
 " Let Kilkenny supply Jerpoint with hay and oats 
 " for the future, in order to prevent Mr. Devine 
 " swamping us entirely, as I don't understand what 
 " we are about there. Write to Mr. Dobbin that on 
 " my return his account shall have my first attention, 
 " and be sure that Mr. B. Dobbin, of Tipperary, shall 
 " get 20 monthly, but on account. Send the folio w- 
 " ing sums to Clonmel : 2 to St. Vincent de Paul, 
 ' 3 to Sisters of Charity, &c. . . . ." 
 
 Nothing could exceed my father's horror of agents 
 buying oats. This was the province of Mr. Hearn and
 
 104 CHARLES BIAXCONI. 
 
 his two subordinate inspectors. Here is a little lecture 
 on the subject : 
 
 " You are aware of my great objection to agents 
 " buying oats, and the extraordinary expense I have 
 " gone to in a new staff of men to do so for the agents ; 
 " and in the face of all this, I find that we are out of 
 " oats at Sligo, and at Boyle. The agent is made to 
 " do the duty of the new staff; that is such a loss to the 
 " establishment. Show this to Messrs. Hearn and 
 " Carrigari, and make the latter explain to ine the 
 
 " reason of it You must not on any account 
 
 " allow any agent to keep one penny balance under 
 " any pretence, as the oats and beans must be supplied 
 " only by Mr. Hearn. Allow no person to draw money 
 " from any of the agents, and dismiss any one who does 
 " not act up to the letter of our orders 
 
 " Since I wrote to you on the 14th I got yours of the 
 " 4th, and of the 14th. Ask Father Kirwan if he 
 
 " thinks young , now in the back office, sufficiently 
 
 " honest to be trusted in money matters. Would he 
 " receive our cash, say 1, 2, or 10, and put it 
 " without compunction into his pocket ? I think not. 
 " If Father Kirwan is also of the same opinion, that he 
 " is honest, send him off on receipt of this to replace 
 " , who shall be forthwith dismissed 
 
 " Many thanks for yours of the 5th instant, received 
 " since I wrote to you on the 14th. Tell Mr. Hearn I 
 " don't agree with him about young Long, who would 
 " soon become most useful under Mr. Tobin. And if 
 " Mr. F had our business at heart, or understood
 
 "THE BIANS." 105 
 
 " it, he would not allow the stable to be without a 
 " proper sconce, and thereby prevent the men from 
 " sticking candles to the walls. Besides, he is throwing 
 " away his time with us, as well' as being in our way, 
 " and his father ought to insist on his going out to 
 " the gold diggings. So I hope Mr. Hearn will take 
 " courage and give the young lad a chance " 
 
 I will conclude these extracts with a little word of 
 thanks, written in a mood of great depression about my 
 sister. " 
 
 " Your letter was of great use to me, though T ought 
 " to be ashamed to acknowledge it. I regret to say I 
 " am often very low-spirited, at my distressing and 
 " peculiar position ; but when I see the zeal with which 
 " my faithful band of officials discharge their duties, 
 " that fills me with pride, and with a sense of all that 
 " I owe to Providence."
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 MR. HAYES' NARRATIVE. 
 
 " I WAS not much over three years of age when I first 
 made the acquaintance of Mr. Bianconi. To him I 
 attribute my taste for horses, and the first thing that I 
 remember about him is his putting me astride on a 
 chair, and making me imagine I was on horseback. 
 From that time until his death I was on the most inti- 
 mate terms of friendship with him. I never knew a 
 man change so little in all those years as Mr. Bianconi 
 did ; almost to the last he was as active, as energetic, 
 and as impulsive as when I first knew him, when 
 his black hair curled all over his head like the 
 ancient Roman statues. He was a handsome man with 
 a fine large head, very bright sparkling eyes, and a 
 deep florid complexion. His mouth was well formed, 
 he was always closely shaven, allowing no hair to grow 
 on his face. His peculiarity was always to wear frilled 
 shirts and large collars, which were invariably limp 
 and tossed in their appearance. In the daytime he 
 always wore a black frock-coat, and whenever I met 
 him of an evening in a swallow-tail coat, he seemed to
 
 't ' V tFvS 
 
 i I . \ ; U=s3v \ jr"'---fj/
 
 MR. HAYES' NARRATIVE. 107 
 
 me to be an altered man. I remember my father 
 painting his portrait, about the year 1830, when he 
 was as I have described him ; the picture was subse- 
 quently exhibited in the Royal Hibernian Academy, 
 and was considered an excellent likeness. 
 
 " At this time in 1830 his car establishment was 
 fully developed. He had then long retired from the 
 gilding trade, and had disposed of his shop in Clonmel, 
 of which I have often heard my father speak, as he knew 
 Mr. Bianconi intimately many years before I was born. 
 About 1830 the Massey Dawson cars were in the zenith 
 of their prosperity.* They ran on two wheels, they 
 held five persons on each side, and were drawn by one 
 horse in the shafts, and another horse whose traces 
 were fixed to a swinging bar running alongside. 
 This swinging bar Mr. Bianconi used to call an out^ 
 rigger. The weight placed on the back of one . horse 
 was very great : eleven persons, including the driver, 
 a lot of luggage piled up on the centre or well 
 of the car, and not infrequently a boy on the top 
 of the luggage. They used, nevertheless, to travel at 
 the rate of seven or eight miles an hour. Mr. Bian- 
 coni subsequently told me that one of the principal 
 reasons that induced him to give up the long two- 
 wheeled cars with shafts, and substitute for them four- 
 wheeled cars, with a pole and traces, was the difficulty 
 
 * The largest and heaviest cars in Mr. Bianconi' 8 establishment were 
 known as the "Finn McCoul's," so called after Ossian's Giant ; then 
 came the " Massey Dawsoii's," named after a popular Tory Squire; 
 and there were the cars called " faugh a ballagh," " clear the way," 
 a fast car, of a lighter build than the others.
 
 108 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 he found in obtaining horses large and powerful enough 
 to stand the weight on the back of the shaft horse. At 
 the conclusion of the war, in 1815, large strong horses 
 were easily obtained ; they were then bred for the 
 artillery, but at the time I speak of they were procured 
 with considerable difficulty and at a great cost. 
 
 " As a boy, both in Waterford and Clonmel, I have 
 often watched the starting of the Bianconi cars. It- 
 was quite a sight in those towns, especially in Clonmel, 
 the head-quarters of the establishment. At Waterford, 
 I used to hurry away from Dr. Graham's school to see 
 the start of the three-o'clock cars, from Cummins's 
 Hotel. But on Saturdays, when we always had a half- 
 holiday, it was my greatest enjoyment to see the har- 
 nessing of the horses, the packing of the luggage on 
 the cars, and the final start, as the drivers blew their 
 horns, cracked their whips, and went off with a flourish. 
 Many a time in Clonmel have I seen Mr. Bianconi 
 relax from the dignity of proprietor, and when the 
 porters, from an unusually large quantity of passengers, 
 were in a difficulty about fitting on the luggage, he 
 would climb up on the top of the car and work 
 harder than any of them. I think he took a peculiar 
 pleasure in this packing when the opportunity offered 
 itself. 
 
 " The cars which went from "Waterford to Kilkenny 
 and to Clonmel every day at three o'clock, Sundays 
 excepted, were driven by two cousins, Lorey and Larry 
 Hearn. These men were both queer fellows, especially 
 Larry, who drove the Kilkenny car. I well remember
 
 MR. HAYES' NARRATIVE. 109 
 
 the delight I used to feel when, about two miles outside 
 Waterford, the road to Kilkenny branched off from the 
 Clonmel road. Here there was a steep bit of a hill, 
 and Larry used to spring his horses up the slope in 
 true coachman style. It was extraordinary the speed at 
 which the horse in the shafts used to gallop up this 
 hill, considering the great weight there was on his back. 
 Accidents occurred very rarely, and I never remember 
 to have heard of a serious one where life was sacri- 
 ficed. 
 
 " After all, travelling on these cars was very pleasant, 
 though there were some who objected to going ' side- 
 ways through the world.' In wet weather there were 
 some inconveniences, it is true. The cars were provided 
 with large oil- cloth aprons, which protected the knees, 
 and came up almost as high as the chest, but these 
 aprons afforded no shelter from the drippings of an 
 umbrella. But worse still was the dreadful state of the 
 cushions in wet weather. At times the passengers used 
 literally to be sitting in a pool of water. Much trouble 
 was taken to prevent the accumulation of wet under 
 the cushions, and for a long time without much 
 effectual success. Mr. Bianconi told me how at length 
 he had solved the problem: he had read in Lover's 
 novel how Handy Andy was described as suffering 
 much discomfort on the top of a coach in rainy weather, 
 until he thought of taking a gridiron with him to sit 
 upon. Mr. Bianconi then felt that he had got the right 
 idea at last, and he had strips of wood placed length- 
 ways on the seats under the cushions, so that the water
 
 110 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 remained in the interstices, and the cushions were kept 
 fairly dry. 
 
 " Once, when I was on the car and Larry was driving, 
 the car came to great grief. The wheel fell off and 
 a spring was broken, and in fact there was a complete 
 smash. Nobody seemed ' one penny the worse ' for a 
 roll on a very dusty road, and it was looked upon 
 rather as an occasion for merriment. Larry said it 
 was like the battle of Waterloo to see all his passengers 
 spread out upon the ground. We were not far from 
 where we had last changed horses, and another car was 
 obtained after a short delay. But when Larry arrived 
 at the next stage, the landlady of the little road-side 
 inn came out and exclaimed, ' Oh dear ! sure that isn't 
 the usual car ! What's become of the other car ? ' 
 And Larry took some broken sticks out of his pocket, 
 and said, ' There, ma'am, are some of the largest 
 portions of it.' 
 
 "I remember once when travelling on one of the 
 small cars, drawn by a single horse, which were for the 
 most part used on the cross-country roads, between 
 small towns, I had another experience. It was un- 
 usually wet weather, and the low-lying country was 
 flooded. On portions of the road the water was above 
 the foot-board of the car, and up to the horse's girths ; 
 so it was thought advisable to get off the car, and the 
 driver and the passengers walked along on the top of 
 the wide bank at the side of the road, throwing stones 
 at the unfortunate horse to make him go on. 
 
 " I have said that the head-quarters of Mr. Bianconi's
 
 MR. HAYES' NARRATIVE. Ill 
 
 establishment was at Clonmel, and he lived in Olomnel 
 for many years. There the largest number of horses 
 were kept, and amongst them were to be found old 
 screws that had come from all parts of the surrounding 
 country ; for when any animal was found to be un- 
 manageable, broken down, or hopelessly vicious, he was 
 forthwith offered to ' Bian,' who was sure to find a use 
 for him. There was a large black stallion, who, if 
 report be true, had eaten three men. He went daily 
 under the Waterford car from Clonmel to Carrick-on- 
 Suir, but there were only two men who dared to touch 
 the brute ; one man was in Carrick and the other in 
 Clonmel. One evening, about half-way to Clonmel, 
 the bridle, as luck would have it, slipped off this horse's 
 head, and Lorey Hearn, who was then driving, pulled 
 up with some difficulty, and got down to re-adjust the 
 bridle ; but the stallion gave a shriek, stood up on his 
 hind legs, and attempted to bite so viciously, that no 
 one dared lay a hand on him. At last Lorey mounted 
 his box, resumed the reins, and managed to drive the 
 remainder of the journey with the bridle round the 
 horse's neck, depending altogether upon his manage- 
 ment of the other horse. 
 
 " All the harness for the horses, and also all the cars 
 and ironwork, were made at the factory in Clonmel. 
 Every horse had a name, and every car had a number ; 
 and the names of the horses at every stage were (or ought 
 to have been) as regularly put in the way-bills as the 
 names of the passengers. Mr. Bianconi seemed to know 
 every horse by name, when and how he had bought
 
 112 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 him, how much money he had given for him, and all 
 his faults and peculiarities. I have often heard a con- 
 versation between himself and Dan Hearn, his factotum 
 and general manager. ' Who says we must take Miss 
 Moll off the Mitchelstown road? She'll do for the 
 Fethard car. Tartar is on his legs again, and will be 
 fit for work next week. Grey Tom is doing well in 
 Sligo, and Tim Healy says he has no trouble at all now 
 with Badger ; he goes like a lamb, he says. Who has 
 Dandy ? ' ' Oh ! Pat Sullivan has him since Wednes- 
 day last. He's a good horse ; but I don't know what 
 we'll do with Stripper, that we bought from old 
 Cassidy.' 
 
 " The way-bills were sent regularly to Mr. Bianconi, 
 and he used to study them attentively. I have often 
 heard him say that he had no time to read anything but 
 way-bills, and indeed he never was a reading man, but 
 very fond of getting people to read to him. When he was 
 away from home, the way-bills were usually sent after 
 him. I have met him travelling in his carriage on 
 the Rock Road from Dublin to Kingstown, and I 
 observed the bottom of the carriage and the cushions all 
 covered with way-bills. He kept his accounts in a way 
 of his own, and had a method of calculating intricate 
 sums that was very rapid, but he was quite unable 
 to explain to anybody how he brought out the result. 
 His figures were like some unknown hieroglyphics, 
 and his ordinary handwriting was at first sight almost 
 illegible. I have heard my father say that Mr. Bian- 
 coni very often after writing a letter was unable to read
 
 MR. HAYES' NARRATIVE. 113 
 
 it himself, that he used to call up Pat O'Neill, one of 
 his assistants, and he read the letter without any diffi- 
 culty. And my children used to say that they knew at 
 once when I got a letter from Mr. Bianconi, because I 
 first held it close up to my eyes, and then looked at it at 
 arms' length, while endeavouring to read it. He told 
 me one day that he thought it the luckiest thing 
 possible that he had never seen a set of account books 
 till late in life ; adding that he felt convinced, if he had 
 seen them, it would have been his ruin. 
 
 " By his own personal experience he had painfully 
 realised the want of a cheap and rapid means of travel- 
 ling from one town to another ; many a weary mile 
 had he walked with a box of engravings strapped on to 
 his back. "When he first came to Clonmel, the^ trades- 
 men and small shopkeepers, if they had business to 
 transact, would walk to Waterford and back, about 
 twenty-eight Irish, or thirty-three English, miles. 
 Coaches were not so common then as they became 
 afterwards, and their charges were too high to make 
 them of general use to the ordinary traveller. Horse- 
 hire also was dear; it was only the better class of 
 tradesmen that could afford to ride on horseback, and 
 they generally rode to Dublin, where they went once 
 a year to make their purchases. Many went from 
 Clonmel to Waterford by the long river boats which 
 brought down bags of flower, corn, pigs, firkins of 
 butter, &c., and brought back coal, hogsheads of sugar, 
 chests of tea, and crates of merchandise. The boats 
 usually took a day and a night to reach Water- 
 
 I
 
 114 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 ford, for the tide had to be waited for from below 
 Carrick. Coming back against the stream, the boats 
 were drawn by horses, and if the river was flooded, all 
 traffic was for a time suspended. I have seen six 
 and even eight horses in a line slowly dragging a 
 heavily-laden boat when there was a flood, and I have 
 seen the animals swept off their legs, amid the shouts 
 and execrations of the boatmen who were helplessly 
 drifting down the stream. To be conveyed the same 
 distance in a sixth part of the time upon a well-appointed 
 car was a wonderful change. The effects it produced 
 among the people can hardly now be understood ; it was 
 in fact a small social revolution. It has been acknow- 
 ledged that Mr. Bianconi, by the establishment of his 
 cars, has contributed as much to the progress and pros- 
 perity of Ireland as any public man of this century ; 
 and because he made his fortune by the people, the 
 benefits to those among whom he made his home were 
 not less real, or looked upon by them in any ungenerous 
 spirit. I have often sat with him in his carriage driving 
 along the roads through his own property, on which 
 very roads he had often walked in former years, when 
 all his worldly goods were carried on his back. Surely 
 a feeling of pride and exultation was allowable in such 
 a man as he looked around upon his own fields, and 
 talked of his struggles of former times. 
 
 " One day, when I was driving with him, he called 
 my attention to a particular place on the road from 
 Cashel to Thurles, close to Boherlahan, where he built 
 the mortuary chapel in which his remains now rest,
 
 ME. HAYES' NARRATIVE. 115 
 
 and he recounted to me, laughing heartily as he went 
 on, how he had once on that spot met with a disaster, 
 which at the time he thought was complete ruin to 
 all his prospects. He , had brought from his shop in 
 Clonmel a large looking-glass with a gilt frame, on which 
 he had bestowed over a fortnight's work. This was the 
 most important job upon which he had ever been en- 
 gaged, and he had bargained with a farmer to carry him 
 and his glass into Thurles, where the purchaser of the 
 glass resided. They had got on their way in the cart all 
 very well as far as this particular spot, when he, in a fit 
 of exuberant humour, began to tickle the horse under 
 his tail with a straw. In an instant the animal reared 
 and plunged, and then dashed off at full speed down 
 the hill, and finally smashed the car into bits and the 
 looking-glass into a thousand atoms against a stone 
 wall at the corner of the road. The farmer over- 
 whelmed him with reproaches for the destruction of his 
 cart and for the loss of his horse, for the animal was 
 nowhere to be seen. But worse still were his own 
 feelings at witnessing the wreck of all his hopes, the 
 absolute loss of his property, and the ruin that he 
 foresaw impending over him : all this, he said, could 
 not be imagined or described. A vein of humour and 
 a turn for fun must have been strongly developed in 
 his character. I have heard my father speak of this 
 real love of humour in Mr. Bianconi, and I have my- 
 self observed it in the latter portion of his life, for it 
 was then that I knew him best. 
 
 " There is another story about a looking-glass which
 
 116 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 I may add as a companion to the foregoing. He 
 was having a large-sized glass taken to a house near 
 Cashel ; it was carried on a man's back, but was such 
 an odd-looking, unwieldy package, that the curiosity 
 of an old woman on the way- side became excited, and 
 she inquired eagerly what it was. Mr. Bianconi was 
 close behind the man carrying the glass, and he imme- 
 diately answered that it was the Repeal of the Union. 
 The old woman's delight and astonishment knew no 
 bounds. She knelt down on her knees, in the middle 
 of the road, to thank God for having preserved her so 
 long that at last in her old days she should have seen 
 the Repeal of the Union. 
 
 " I had heard that the first car he started ran be- 
 tween Clonmel and the picturesque little town of 
 Cahir, a distance of about eight miles, and I asked Mr. 
 Bianconi why he selected that small town in preference 
 to others that were larger, instancing Cashel, Carrick- 
 on-Suir, or Fethard. ' Well/ he said, ' that is a very 
 natural question, The reason that most influenced me 
 in selecting Cahir for my first venture was, that it 
 was the only town to which I could make the journey 
 there and back with one horse ; the other towns were 
 too far distant, twelve miles and more.' And he also 
 said, that although there was a good deal of intercourse 
 and traffic between Clonmel and Cahir, there was no 
 mode of public conveyance, such as the boats to Carrick 
 by the river, or the mail coach to Dublin, which went 
 through Cashel. His first attempt, he thought, was 
 going to be a failure ; scarcely anybody went by the
 
 To face page 1 1C.
 
 MR. HAYES' NARRATIVE. 117 
 
 car. People were used to trudging along on foot, and 
 they continued to do so, thus saving their money which 
 was more valuable to them than their time. Another 
 man would have abandoned the speculation, but Mr. 
 Bianconi did nothing of the kind. He started an oppo- 
 sition car, at a cheaper rate, which was not known to be 
 his, not even by the rival drivers who raced against 
 each other for the foremost place. The excitement of 
 the contest, the cheapness of the fare, the occasional free 
 lifts given to passengers, soon began to attract a paying 
 public, and before very long both the cars every day 
 came in full. He had bought a great strong ' yellow 
 horse,' as he called him, to run in the opposition car ; 
 he gave, he said, 20 for the animal. One evening his 
 own recognised driver came to him in great pride and 
 excitement : ' You know the great big yallah horse 
 under the opposition car. Well, sir, he'll niver run 
 another yard. I broke his heart this night. I raced him , 
 in from beyant Moore o' Barns, and he'll niver thravel 
 agin.' Mr. Bianconi told me he was obliged to show 
 the greatest gratification at the loss of his beast ; but it 
 gave him enough of the opposition car, which*there and 
 then came to an end like the poor horse. The habit of 
 travelling on a car increased amongst the people when 
 they had become alive to its advantage ; the Cahir car 
 became a success and the forerunner of many. 
 
 " In these early days Mr. Bianconi still carried on his 
 gilding business, and the selling of prints ; he used also 
 to take in lodgers in his house. Alpenny, an English 
 artist, occupied his drawing-room floor it was from him
 
 118 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 that my father first learnt to draw and on the second 
 floor Purcell, a miniature painter, lodged. Pat O'Neill, 
 Mr. Bianconi's apprentice, slept in the attic along with a 
 numerous colony of rats, who infested the place to such an 
 extent that he always had a whip by him on his pillow to 
 beat them from off the counterpane. Pat O'Neill was 
 once sadly in want of some new shirts, but he hesitated to 
 let his master know of his need. * Why don't you tell 
 him ? ' old Peggy, the housekeeper, would say to him. 
 ' Sure you know the master has no idea of the state you're 
 in.' At length Pat got his opportunity. ' Pat, bring me 
 a glass-cloth,' said Mr. Bianconi one day in the shop. 
 * Yes, sir,' said Pat, and pushing down on one side the 
 waistband of his trousers he pulled out a handful of rags. 
 ' If you want more, sir, I've got plenty more here,' he 
 said, pulling out a similar handful from the other side. 
 
 Mr. Bianconi was astounded. ' Oh, by gor ! Mrs. M , 
 
 this boy is in a dreadful state,' he said, appealing to 
 old Peggy. ' Why was not I told of this before ? ' By 
 this trick Pat O'Neill got a supply of new shirts. 
 
 " Alpenny was a landscape painter, and gave lessons 
 in drawing ; and, probably incited by Purcell's minia- 
 tures on ivory, he took to painting portraits in oil, not, 
 however, I fancy, with much success. Old Peggy was 
 a connoisseur, and one day when Alpenny was away 
 giving a lesson, she came into the room in which my 
 father was working. She was standing opposite to 
 Alpenny's easel looking at the portrait he had been 
 painting. ' Sure that's not skin colour,' she said ; ' go 
 up-stairs and look at Mr. Purcell's ladies and gentle-
 
 MR. HATES' NARRATIVE. 119 
 
 men. 'Tis there you'll see the rale skin colour. Sure 
 them brown things isn't skin colour.' 
 
 " When the cars became definitely established on the 
 different roads leading out of Clonmel, Mr. Bianconi 
 took a fancy to have drab top-coats and glazed hats for 
 his drivers, who, in truth, were often poorly clad. But 
 the new clothes were not popular with the men ; they 
 considered it a sort of livery, and preferred the inde- 
 pendence of their own ragged garments, so that it 
 became difficult to get them to wear the coats. I have 
 heard my father describe a dinner-party which Mr. 
 Bianconi gave about this time. Alpenny was at it, 
 as was my father, and also the parish priest, ^Father 
 Flannery. Father Flannery left early ; it was in the 
 middle of summer, on a Sunday evening, and my father 
 was deputed to see the old man to his house in the 
 Irish town, as the upper part of Clonmel was called. 
 The priest asked for the loan of a coat, and Mr. Bian- 
 coni produced one of the driver's top- coats, and held 
 it open, winking at my father, while the poor old gen- 
 tleman mechanically thrust his arms into the sleeves, 
 thinking little as to the form or the cut of the coat he 
 was putting on. But it was rather a trial to my father, 
 who, as a young man reputed to show some talent for 
 art, was well known in Clonmel, and those who only saw 
 their backs thought it odd that young Hayes should be 
 walking through the town arm-in-arm with one of Bian- 
 coni's drivers, whilst those who saw poor Father Flan- 
 nery, enveloped in the drab overcoat, perceived at once 
 that some joke was being played upon the worthy priest.
 
 120 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " It was about this time also that an occurrence took 
 place in Carrick to which I have heard Mr. Bianconi 
 frequently allude, as if to an old penal law at that time 
 still in force, which would not permit any Roman 
 Catholic to own a house of more than a certain value, 
 and that he could be compelled to part with it at a 
 nominal sum to any one professing Protestantism. I 
 fancy, being a foreigner, he confounded the Alien Act 
 with the penal laws, for the latter had been repealed 
 by the Irish Parliament in 1780, long before Mr. Bian- 
 coni's time ; but he used to say that he had then stables 
 and a store in Carrick, that a scampish resident in the 
 town took advantage of this law, and obliged him to 
 give up the store. This proceeding was very much 
 reprobated in Carrick, especially among the Protestant 
 portion of the inhabitants, and a collection was imme- 
 diately made in the town to indemnify Mr. Bianconi. 
 In fact, the extreme stringency of the law only served 
 to defeat its enactments ; Protestants, in many instances, 
 connived at and strove to nullify the unjust penal laws. 
 This was specially the case with regard to landed pro- 
 perty, which was often kept in the possession of the 
 Catholic owners by the help and co-operation of their 
 Protestant neighbours. 
 
 " I well remember my grandmother telling me of 
 an incident very similar to that which Mr. Bianconi 
 described. An old Catholic gentleman, one of the 
 Power family, used to drive into Waterford with four 
 fine horses, and on one occasion they were seized 
 as being beyond the value a Catholic could by law
 
 MB. HATES' NARKATIVE. 121 
 
 possess. The old gentleman was very wrath, and on 
 the Sunday following he drove in to mass at Waterford 
 with four bullocks harnessed to the family coach. It 
 was a strange state of society into which Mr. Bianconi 
 fell when he first came to Ireland, so different from 
 the Catholic Italy where he was born and passed his 
 early boyhood. He told me that a great difference 
 was made between him and his co-religionists on 
 account of his being a foreigner. At that time he said 
 Catholics were generally looked down upon as beings 
 of an inferior race, they were all^ classed together as 
 being low, vulgar, and ignorant, even though their 
 forefathers had been gentlefolk. The offspring of the 
 cultured gentleman soon degenerates under the influence 
 of poverty and oppression ; the wonder is that any kind 
 of gentility, education, or property was left among 
 them. It is difficult for us now, in the year 1877, to 
 realise what the social state of Ireland then was, and 
 through which young Bianconi fought his way to pros- 
 perity and wealth. I can recollect but little before the 
 passing of the Catholic Emancipation Act in 1829 ; at 
 that time the prevalent idea was that if you met a 
 well-dressed and intelligent man, he must, as a matter 
 of course, be a Protestant. 
 
 " I suppose it was from my father's profession as an 
 artist that socially our family mixed so much amongst 
 Protestants. There was neither the taste nor the means 
 amongst the Catholic inhabitants of the small towns in 
 Ireland for the cultivation of art ; many found it hard 
 enough to make both ends meet, and of those who con-
 
 122 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 trived to save money, very few possessed either refine- 
 ment or education. The division into Catholic and 
 Protestant society was very marked indeed, and to be 
 recognised as belonging to one was to be tabooed by the 
 other. A ridiculous aping of the manners and dress of 
 the better class prevailed ; the well-to-do shopkeepers' 
 wives and daughters turned out on Sundays in gaudy 
 finery that sat almost grotesquely upon them. The few 
 Catholic families who did belong to the gentry led com- 
 paratively isolated lives ; they were too few and too 
 widely scattered to have much association amongst 
 themselves. Such was the state of society as I can 
 recollect it when I was a boy, but what must it have 
 been when Mr. Bianconi first came to Ireland ? At the 
 time I speak of about the year 1830 a rapid and 
 easy intercourse had been established between the 
 different towns by means of the Bianconi cars. Money 
 had become rather more plentiful, political equality had 
 been conceded, and a spirit of independence had grown 
 and spread with the progress of education. 
 
 " "When my father subsequently became a resident 
 in Dublin, I found the same distinctions existing. I 
 remember about that time meeting a gentleman from 
 London, an accomplished musician, who came over to 
 perform at the concerts of the Philharmonic Society, 
 then newly formed, and he remarked that he was 
 unable to understand the social distinctions of Dublin. 
 About the year 1832 my father was painting the por- 
 trait of the Rev. Charles Boyton, a Fellow of Trinity 
 College. This gentleman took a prominent part in
 
 MR. HATES' NARRATIVE. 123 
 
 politics, and he was very Orange in his tendencies. An 
 old friend of my father's brought a relative of his to see 
 this portrait of Mr. Boyton ; it was generally held to 
 be a good likeness, and so thought the visitor, who, 
 turning round to my father's friend, said, ' Oh ! Henry, 
 don't you think he could eat a Papist ? ' My father's 
 friend was considerably put out by this unexpected 
 remark, but he promptly said, ' No ; for he has not 
 devoured our friend Hayes, as you may see.' Now this 
 outspoken expression of feeling on the part of the friend 
 of my father's friend would not have been made had he 
 known that the painter was a Catholic ; but it exempli- 
 fied a feeling very prevalent at that time, and which 
 happily is now nearly, if not altogether, extinct. 
 
 " These circumstances occurred long after the period 
 I have been describing, when Bianconi carried on his 
 business in Clonmel as shopkeeper and small car pro- 
 prietor. It was in his shop that the first important 
 picture painted by my father then a boy of seventeen 
 was publicly exhibited. It was a view of Clonmel 
 from the bridge over the Suir. Alpeiiny, my father's 
 master, was very proud of the work of his pupil, and it 
 had numerous admirers among the humbler classes, 
 who formed a crowd around the window and criticized 
 it freely, and, to my father's chagrin, they discovered 
 that he had forgotten to put in the lamps upon the quay. 
 Some twenty years after, while I was still a school- 
 boy, a drawing of mine was exhibited in another win- 
 dow in the same street, of one of Bianconi's cars laden 
 with passengers and luggage, and moving along at a
 
 124 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 fabulous pace. It was the wonder and admiration of 
 my schoolfellows, who were unanimous in declaring it 
 to be copperplate ! that being the highest praise they 
 could bestow upon a work of art. This drawing, to- 
 gether with "some others, was subsequently engraved and 
 published in London. 
 
 " Mr. Bianconi used to say that at this time he had 
 in his establishment in Clonmel two Tommys, three 
 Jimmys, one Patsey, three Larrys, four Paddys, two 
 Mickeys, three Dickeys, four Johnnys, one Peter, three 
 Jerrys, two Terry s, and one Mickeleen. One of the 
 Jerrys was distinguished by the title of 'Jerry the 
 Royal.' He was the porter specially attached to the 
 cars, but he had a great many irregular competitors 
 who skirmished around the passengers on the arrival of 
 a car, and he the Jerry was in the habit of impress- 
 ing upon the passengers that he was the ' rale porter,' 
 which he pronounced like royal, hence his cognomen. 
 He had some defect in the palate of his mouth, that 
 gave rather a nasal sound to his speech. 
 
 " During Mr. Bianconi's long residence in the south 
 of Ireland he acquired a number of the idioms and 
 peculiarities of pronunciation of the people among 
 whom he lived. ' By gor ! boys/ was a favourite phrase 
 of his, and by several he was thought to be an Irish- 
 man. But he never lost his foreign accent in many 
 words ; nor could he quite rid himself of saying 
 dis and dat for this and that ; his English, hpwever, 
 was good, and he spoke it with perfect fluency. His 
 manners were polished and agreeable, and it was im-
 
 MR. HAYES' NARRATIVE. 125 
 
 possible to be long in his company without seeing that 
 he was a shrewd and an intelligent man. He was a 
 hard and a keen man of business, but he was a very 
 honourable and upright man ; he was a devout Catholic, 
 and strict in the observances of his religion, though 
 liberal in his views. He possessed great knowledge of 
 character, and he had a singular faculty for picking out 
 the men suited to the position he required them to fill. 
 lie took a country-house near Clonmel ; he became a 
 director of the National Bank there, was elected a 
 member of the corporation of the town, and subse- 
 quently he filled the office of mayor. 
 
 " At various times he encountered considerable oppo- 
 sition upon the roads over which his cars travelled, but 
 at length he tired out and overcame his opponents. 
 They always began by offering to take passengers at 
 reduced fares ; but as he had arranged his prices at as 
 low a sum as could be remunerative, he allowed his 
 rivals to go on without lowering his charges, or he 
 reduced them so as to be but a fraction over the oppo- 
 sition cars, which on every journey were overcrowded. 
 The consequence was that though Mr. Bianconi's cars 
 were not so full as those of his opponents, he continued 
 to run them at a small profit, but his rivals broke down 
 their horses under the extra weight in the daily 
 struggle for the foremost place on the road. Mr. 
 Bianconi, too, generally received the subsidy from the 
 Government for carrying the mails, and the more 
 respectable class were content to pay the extra trifle 
 for the sake of avoiding the crowd on the opposition
 
 126 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 cars. On the backs of all his cars the names of the 
 larger towns in the various parts of Ireland to which 
 his lines extended were conspicuously set out in gold 
 letters upon a red ground. The cars were well turned 
 out, the manufacture was excellent, and they were hand- 
 somely painted and highly varnished ; yellow and crim- 
 son were the preponderating colours, contrasting very 
 strongly with the clumsy ill-painted vehicles that were 
 started to oppose him. The only serious opposition he 
 ever encountered was set up by a Mr. Gilliard, who 
 started with a considerable capital, and put cars on to 
 several of the best-paying roads. His cars were good, 
 they were very like Bianconi's, and they had the names 
 of the towns through which they ran painted on the 
 backs. They lasted for a year and a half, and caused 
 some loss to Mr. Bianconi, but at last brought disaster to 
 their owner. There was also an opposition set up by Mr. 
 Casey, of Clonmel, backed up by a Mr. Stokes, a wealthy 
 tradesman in the town. This created a great deal of 
 partisan feeling, especially amongst those employed 
 on the cars ; and the racing of one against the other 
 was carried on to a rather dangerous extent, but Bian- 
 coni's car was generally in advance. 
 
 " About the year 1833 Mr. Bianconi began to sub- 
 stitute four-wheeled cars for the two-wheelers ; he 
 found that the weight on the shaft horse was too great. 
 He also said that it became no longer possible to get a 
 supply of horses similar to those he used formerly to 
 buy, a lighter description of horse was then mostly 
 bred by the farmers. The four-wheeled cars were
 
 MR. HATES' NARRATIVE. 127 
 
 fitted with a pole instead of shafts, and held seven per- 
 sons on each side ; three horses were used, driven uni- 
 corn fashion, and sometimes when the roads were heavy 
 and the load greater than usual an additional horse was 
 put on. There were some four-wheeled cars holding 
 only five on each side, and drawn by two horses ; on 
 the small cross roads the two-wheeled cars, holding 
 three on each side, and drawn by one horse, were still 
 used. 
 
 " I believe it was also about this time that he was 
 over in London making arrangements with the autho- 
 rities at the Post-office. He found some difficulty in 
 describing his cars, and wrote to me asking me to make 
 a few drawings of them, and send them over to him at 
 once. I was only a boy at school at the time, but I 
 complied with his request, and sent him the drawings. 
 He told me afterwards that they answered his purpose 
 admirably. I remember perfectly well that I was 
 unable to make out from his letter where he was stop- 
 ping in London, he always wrote a most illegible hand, 
 and as no one could help me to read the address, I cut 
 it off his letter and fastened it on to my envelope, very 
 doubtful that it would ever reach him. I had heard 
 that at the London Post-office experts were employed 
 for this purpose, and when I knew that my letter had 
 safely arrived at its destination I was convinced of their 
 powers. 
 
 " I suppose it was the success of those little drawings 
 that induced me to make some more ambitious attempts 
 in the same line. Mr. Bianconi was so well pleased
 
 128 CHARLES BIANCOXI. 
 
 with my new productions that he conceived the idea of 
 getting Ackerman to bring out a series of six aquatint 
 coloured prints, entitled ' Car-Travelling in the South of 
 Ireland.' One of the pictures showed the passengers 
 sitting under their umbrellas on the car, the rain was 
 pouring down in torrents, and the horses were dead 
 beat and covered with mud. Mr. Bianconi looked at 
 the picture for a moment. ' We won't have that,' said 
 he; 'it's more like the real thing, though!' I was 
 in Dublin with my father when a traveller from Acker- 
 man's called to show me the prints. I felt very proud, 
 I remember, especially when I saw in the corner, 
 M. A, Hayes, pinxt. When I look now at these boyish 
 sketches, I am surprised to see that they are so good. 
 
 " In after years, when I lived in Dublin with my 
 father, I met Mr. Bianconi less frequently, but when 
 he was in town he always came to see us. As he grew 
 old he began to get fat, and his hair showed signs of 
 greyness. He had purchased a house and property at 
 Longfield, near Cashel, and became quite a country 
 gentleman. He was made a J.P., and also a deputy- 
 lieutenant. And he also became more of a politician ; 
 he was on intimate terms with Smith O'Brien, and 
 joined the '82 Club. I remember seeing him in the 
 green-and-gold club uniform, but it did not suit him 
 so well as did that of the deputy-lieutenant which he 
 wore at a later period."
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE BIAN WORTHIES. 
 
 MY father used to glory in the fine set of men he had 
 in his employment, and whom he had trained to his 
 own uses. Worthiest of all was our good old friend, 
 Daniel Hearn, always called Dan Hearn. He has 
 already been mentioned, and as his name will again 
 frequently appear, I must try to describe him here at 
 the head of this especial chapter. At home we were all 
 so fond of him that what I can write seems to be very 
 tame and colourless, and totally fails to bring back the 
 man's fine genial presence and delightful heartiness. 
 He was a splendid specimen of a Tipperary man, fully 
 six feet high and broad in proportion, with the plea- 
 santest smile and the whitest teeth, the rosiest coloured 
 cheek, and the most delightfully mellow brogue pos- 
 sible. His natural fine health and good temper kept 
 him full of vigour and fun even to the last. The con- 
 stant exposure to every kind of weather, and the wear 
 and tear of his life, had developed in him some natural 
 tendency to heart disease, and he died, under seventy, 
 after a year of failing health, just after my father was 
 
 K
 
 130 CHAHLES BIANCONI. 
 
 beginning to get over the effects of his broken thigh. 
 I firmly believe that a winter tour of inspection in the 
 west, and the extra work my father's accident imposed 
 upon him, hastened his death. He sent a farewell 
 message to my father, begging him to sell the cars, for 
 after my brother died my father had willed them to 
 Ban Hearn, but he survived both the institution and 
 the man whom he wished to benefit. 
 
 I find a letter of Mr. Hearn's to my father's clerk 
 written from his sick-bed, asking who my mother had 
 to keep her company during my father's long con- 
 valescence ; and in another letter full of minute details 
 about the changes of horses consequent upon the out- 
 break of glanders, this pathetic passage occurs : 
 " Your illness is no doubt most tedious, but you are 
 a healthy and a strong man, while in my case I can 
 see no chance. Nothing left undone, but yet no im- 
 provement, rather the reverse ; but welcome be the will 
 of God." 
 
 I do not suppose Mr. Hearn ever had much educa- 
 tion given to him ; his handwriting was nearly as 
 illegible as my father's. His mother had tried to 
 make an apothecary of him, but after a six weeks' 
 trial he quitted his master. Dan Hearn was one of 
 nature's gentlemen ; he knew all my father's most 
 private affairs, still he never overstepped a certain 
 invisible social line in the most familiar intimacy. I 
 might fancy that I over-estimated my old friend's 
 good qualities, but my husband, who certainly had 
 a pretty fair experience of 'life, concurred in all my
 
 THE BIAN WORTHIES. 131 
 
 opinions, and always professed the greatest regard and 
 esteem for him. 
 
 Dan Hearn was the head man over all the traffic of 
 the establishment ; he was the chief buyer of horses 
 and of stores, with the fullest power of changing men 
 and horses, subject only to my father's all- pervading 
 sway. He had even power to draw cheques. Under 
 him were three principal travelling agents, with similar 
 though lesser powers Messrs. Carrigan, Peter Mullaly, 
 and Phil Sullivan ; the two latter had risen from being 
 drivers. Mr. Carrigan I remember distinctly, because 
 he was frequently summoned to the congress, and my 
 father took a special interest in him. He became an 
 agent very young, and he had a mother who was also 
 an agent. His wife, too, was agent at Galway even 
 during her husband's lifetime, and only resigned her 
 post when that line was sold after my father had retired 
 from business. Her husband was a particularly lively, 
 merry, active man. I remember having seen him 
 vault over two horses. Mrs, Carrigan was also- a 
 great favourite of my father's, and he used to delight 
 in telling her how he turned off her husband for marry- 
 ing without his consent, and then forgave him when, 
 he met his wife, he having called upon them purposely 
 in order to carry out his rule of dismissal. 
 
 At that time there prevailed a very horrible practice 
 which I hardly know how to describe. Girls, and par- 
 ticularly those of the lower classes who dwelt in the 
 towns, were encouraged by the state of the law to trump 
 up scandalous charges against any young man who had.
 
 132 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 been frequently seen in their company, and more than 
 one young fellow had to choose between the gallows 
 and a perjured bride. To protect his men from this 
 state of things, my father made a law that any bachelor 
 in his establishment who married without his leave 
 should be dismissed. He used to say that the best 
 results followed from this law, that it kept the men out 
 of the clutches of these harpies, and that it checked too 
 early and imprudent marriages. Though my father 
 was at no time an admirer of the female sex, and pos- 
 sessed a dread mingled with antipathy towards young 
 and good-looking widows whom he declared ought to 
 be choked by the girls in whose way they stood yet 
 he frequently employed women as agents. As I have 
 already said, he had at one time over twenty female 
 agents ; but there were many difficulties in the way of 
 women at these posts which would seem almost to unfit 
 them for the undertaking. They had to maintain a 
 strict supervision over the stable-yard, and to see that 
 the ostlers did their work properly, that the horses got 
 their proper amount of corn, and that they were pro- 
 perly groomed after they had come in heated from 
 their journey. The wonder is, indeed, that they should 
 have done their work so well ; and my father used to 
 take a great interest in his female officers, as he gran- 
 diloquently called them. One prosperous lady, who 
 was not an agent in her own name, but who used to 
 help her uncle, was a Miss Bragg, and my father 
 persistently kept asking her why she did not change 
 her ugly name, until he was silenced by the rejoinder
 
 THE BIAN WORTHIES. 133 
 
 that she might not have so much to boast of if she 
 did. 
 
 As a child I remember being often fetched into the 
 office, and told to shake hands with sundry weather- 
 beaten drivers, almost enveloped in their capes and 
 great-coats. Glasses of whisky used to be put into my 
 little hands to give to them, which they would take with 
 a profound bow, and wish good luck to Miss Minnie. 
 Occasionally it would happen that some extraordinary 
 drivers were teetotallers ; they were sent down to get 
 their dinners in the kitchen, and they did not omit to 
 give me their blessings as they went. I hear that as a 
 rule the drivers were men fat and red in the face, two 
 facts easily accounted for by a sedentary life passed in 
 the open air, and with plenty of means of getting good 
 food. Many of them were well-to-do in the world, 
 and showed by their general appearance that their 
 families were honest and respectable. There were the 
 three Mullalys, the sons of a prospering yeoman, whose 
 fine farm had to be sold after his death. These were 
 the sort of men my father was always anxious to 
 secure. The three brothers all went into his ser- 
 vice, where they stayed and prospered. Then there 
 was Phil Sullivan, whose letters, written in a neat, 
 old-fashioned, copper-plate hand, were such a relief 
 to me when I had to act as secretary. On one 
 occasion Phil was offered a couple of half-crowns to 
 delay the car a few minutes, the briber saying that 
 he would take all the blame upon his own shoulders. 
 Honest Phil indignantly refused the money, and showed
 
 134 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 that he was considerably astonished at the offer being 
 made. 
 
 Tim Haly was a paragon driver. He was always 
 known on the road as Lord Gort, though how he got 
 his nickname I have never been able to ascertain. He 
 was sober as a judge, and a parish clerk could not have 
 been more assiduous than he in saying his prayers. 
 Tim was a prime favourite with all the ladies, and 
 especially with the Quaker ladies, who travelled on 
 his car. His line was from Clonmel to Cork, and one 
 day as he was going along, driving his three horses at 
 a good swinging pace, a donkey-cart was in the middle 
 of the road, full in the way of the long Bian. Tim 
 shouted out, " Keep your own side." The donkey- 
 driver made frantic efforts to pull his beast anywhere, 
 and triumphantly drew him up in the very middle of 
 the wrong side of the road, straight in the way of Tim 
 Haly's car. Tim had to perform prodigies of skill to 
 avoid absolute destruction to the humbler equipage, 
 and, instead of using strong language, which might 
 naturally be expected, he simply exclaimed, with the 
 most perfect good-humour, " Shure, you did it as well 
 as you could ! " 
 
 One reason why my father was fond of Tim Haly 
 was that Tim Haly was fond of his work. I will now 
 let my father tell his own story about him. 
 
 " Tim Haly," he said, " was an old and valued 
 " servant. I had him for many years driving a long 
 
 " Bian from Cork to Clonmel."- A long Bian was a 
 
 long car carrying nineteen passengers eight on each
 
 THE BIAN WORTHIES. 135 
 
 side, two on the well, and one on the high seat next to 
 the driver. It was drawn by three horses, two wheelers 
 and a leader, to which another horse was added when 
 
 the roads were heavy. " Tim was very popular along 
 
 " the road, being a good-natured fellow and full of 
 " stories. He always kept the passengers amused, and 
 " generally -contrived to avoid a row with the cart- 
 " drivers, who were more frequent on the road before 
 " the days of railways than they are now. Tim's 
 " manner of clearing the way was an exception to the 
 " general rule. Instead of using abusive language to a 
 " man who was driving right in the middle of the 
 " road, or, worse still, who was on his wrong side, he 
 " would call out, ' "Wake up, my boy, wake up ! ' or, 
 " ' Do, like a good fellow, give me a little bit of the 
 " ' road, if you please ! ' And the result was, that Tim 
 " at all times got a clear stage and a ' God speed you ! ' 
 " One day he came to me, and seemed very uneasy. I 
 " asked him what was on his mind. He said that the 
 " boys below there in Clonmel were very much troubled 
 " at seeing the priest being so much up and down with 
 " the parson. It appeared that the two clergymen 
 " were both of them very sociable good fellows, who 
 " frequently partook of each other's hospitality, and did 
 " not allow the fact of their being pastors of different 
 " flocks to interfere with, their friendship. Tim, not 
 " quite comprehending this ideal state of things, said to 
 " me ' We had a meeting last night, you know, and 
 " 'determined to send a deputation to his reverence to 
 " ' ask him not to be so great with the parson.' On the
 
 136 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 " following morning Tim accordingly introduced the 
 " deputation to the priest, and made known their 
 " wishes to him. His reverence told them not to be 
 " uneasy, as he was trying to convert the parson, 
 " and he thought he would succeed, as he was going to 
 " dine at the rectory on the following day ; and he 
 " added that, if Tim would come up to him on the 
 " morning after, he would let him know of his success. 
 " So the deputation expressed their thanks and went 
 " away. Now, his reverence always took his tumbler 
 " of punch after dinner, to which he added a second 
 " when he dined with his good friend the parson. And 
 " having recently received a present of a few gallons of 
 " ' the real old stuff/ that had never paid duty, a happy 
 " thought struck him that a gallon of it might be 
 " acceptable at the rectory. At the appointed hour 
 " he arrived at his friend's house with the potheen, 
 " and a jolly good evening they had over it. By eleven 
 " o'clock it was evident that the staying powers of the 
 " parson were not equal to those of his guest, and after 
 " many efforts to preserve his equilibrium he fairly gave 
 " way. The good nature of the priest would not let 
 " him depart without first providing for the comfort of 
 " his host, so he called in the man-servant, and with 
 " his assistance he put the parson into bed. The next 
 " morning Tim and his deputation, who had been 
 " totally forgotten by the priest, called to know the 
 " result of the previous evening, and anxiously inquired 
 " whether his reverence had succeeded in converting 
 " the parson. ' Not quite,' was the reply ; ' but I
 
 THE BIAN WORTHIES. 137 
 
 " * staggered him amazingly ! ' ' Good ! ' says Tim, ' I 
 " told the boys he could never stand before you ! ' : 
 
 Jim Halloran used to drive upon the same line from 
 Clonmel to Cork. He was an oddity in his way, though 
 a different man from Tim Haly. He was a sturdy, 
 witty, insolent fellow,, and a great politician. Like 
 most Irish "characters," he was not always able to 
 resist the attractions of the whisky bottle ; he did not 
 lay up a store for his old age, and I am sorry to say 
 that he finished his career as a helper in the stable. 
 Many a time he was seen driving his long car into 
 Hearn's hotel-yard in Clonmel with a pocket-handker- 
 chief tied round his head, his hat having been left behind 
 on the way. Once he had been racing an opposition 
 car, and arrived without any passengers at all, and no 
 cushions on the seats. My father was in the office when 
 he came in, and had him up for punishment Jim 
 swore that he started with two Quaker ladies, and in 
 about an hour's time the two ladies arrived in a 
 common cart. They were not seriously hurt, but their 
 dresses were torn and considerably damaged. My father 
 was all sympathetic suavity : he repaid them their fare, 
 and offered to buy each of them a new gown. Jim was 
 often threatened with dismissal ; but he was far too 
 conscious of his own value to take the threat at more 
 than it was worth. The moment that either my father 
 or Dan Hearn reproached him too severely, he would 
 turn on them and dismiss them. No one knows how 
 often he did not give warning to his employers. 
 
 Guards were, of course, attached to all the coaches,
 
 138 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 in some cases there were two or three. One was the 
 official mail guard, put on by the Post-office ; the others 
 were supplied by my father to attend to parcels and to 
 the passengers. At one time, however, during a fit of 
 official economy, the coach proprietors had to supply 
 the mail guards an ingenious arrangement, by which 
 some saving was effected to the department. Most 
 famous of all guards was M'Cluskie, whom I recognised 
 in one of Mr. Anthony Trollope's novels " The Mac- 
 dermots of Ballycloran," and from him I got the fol- 
 lowing letter about the old guard : 
 
 "I remember M'Cluskie well. He was guard on 
 the Dublin and Boyle coach. I did not know that 
 he had ever been one of your father's folk. But he 
 and I were great friends. ' A fellow-feeling makes us 
 wondrous kind,' he said to me once on the top of the 
 coach, when I had been vindicating the character of 
 donkeys. 
 
 " One day I was going down the streets of Lucan, 
 and I was proselytizing him, telling him how wrong 
 were the Papists and how right were the Protestants ! 
 We were then passing just between the church and the 
 chapel. ' Yes,' said he, ' I see it all. While we raise 
 on high the blessed emblem of our redemption, you 
 believe in the cock.' There was an old-fashioned 
 weathercock on the spire of the church. 
 
 " When he was guard on one of the coaches which 
 then went from Dublin to Kingstown he had to go 
 down in plain clothes to come up with his coach, and 
 on such occasions he would always be very spruce. He
 
 THE BIAN WOKTHIES. 139 
 
 went down on a car with an officer from the barracks, 
 and the two men quarrelled on the way. The officer 
 demanded his card preparing for a duel. M'Cluskie 
 brought out a card with a picture of a coach upon it, 
 showing a man blowing a long horn, and pointing with 
 his finger to the picture he said, ' That's me.' ' I 
 knew you were some low fellow/ said the officer. 
 ' I am a low fellow,' said M'Cluskie, ' but you didn't 
 know it.' 
 
 " He shot a man once in a drinking-house, and killed 
 him, he suspecting that the man had murdered his 
 father. He had twitted the man with the murder, and 
 told him that he would shoot him if he crossed a certain 
 bench. The man rushed to attack M'Cluskie, and 
 M'Cluskie shot him dead. He was tried and acquitted. 
 
 " He drank, and then for years he became a teetotaller. 
 He was a man of great courage, of much reading, and 
 of a most ready wit." 
 
 A lady tells me that her sisters used frequently to 
 travel under his charge ; and one of them remarked 
 that he was not playing on his key-bugle, as usual, 
 " The girl I left behind me," and he at once replied, 
 " Why should I play it when all the pretty ones are 
 with me." 
 
 Dan Hearn had many stories about M'Cluskie, mostly 
 relating to the gullibility of the British tourist. 
 M'Cluskie, travelling all day, generally brought some 
 eatable provisions with him, and these he used to put 
 into the top of the boot. A cockney tourist discovered 
 this small store, and when the guard had alighted at a
 
 140 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 stage to deliver his mails, he quietly purloined and ate 
 the packet of sandwiches. Something of a suppressed 
 grin on his countenance aroused M'Cluskie's suspicions. 
 He opened the boot, and called out in a tragic voice, 
 " Where are the sandwiches ? " The cockney could not 
 prevent himself from smiling. The guard then called 
 out in a louder tone, " Can any one tell me about the 
 
 poisoned sandwiches for the keeper of to poison 
 
 the cur dogs ? " This was too much for the Londoner. 
 At once he began to feel ill. M'Cluskie was very kind 
 to him, and recommended his stopping at the next stage 
 and taking a strong emetic, with which recommenda- 
 tion he complied. Later on in his journey, when he 
 had partly recovered from his dose, M'Cluskie further 
 punished him by setting all the passengers into roars of 
 laughter, declaring that he had brought the sandwiches 
 for his own luncheon. 
 
 Good old M'Cluskie ! He left the breezy coach-top 
 for the close guard's van in a railway train ; but he did 
 not live long after he quitted my father's service. All 
 his fun and drollery, his reckless pluck, his staunch 
 theology, the wide and varied knowledge of books which 
 he contrived to pick up, besides his unconscious studies 
 of men and women, deserve a better record than what 
 can be written of him here. 
 
 Then there was John O'Mahony, another famous 
 guard, whose life is like a romance, not without its 
 tragic side. He seems the very antithesis of Dame 
 Comedy's well-beloved son M'Cluskie. Not but what 
 John O'Mahony, Esquire, now her Majesty's Collector
 
 THE BIA.N WORTHIES. 141 
 
 of Customs at Natal, has as keen a sense of humour as 
 any one. He was the son of a most respectable and 
 intelligent man, rich, too, for his station in life, who 
 had a large business as a smith and farrier in Clonmel. 
 He had the shoeing of all the Bian horses, and he 
 naturally wished that his son should succeed him. But 
 John's mind was then more ambitious. His father's 
 great-grand-uncle had been a captain in James II.'s 
 army ; " and when " I quote John O'Mahony's words, 
 in a letter written from Natal " when that worthless 
 
 X 
 
 poltroon's (James II.) hope was gone, this Captain 
 O'Mahony went with the Irish brigade to the French 
 service. He so distinguished himself at the siege of 
 Cremona as to win the esteem of King Louis, and in 
 the course of time was a great favourite with that king, 
 who created him Count." 
 
 All this stirred up the mind of John, and in spite of 
 all persuasion he would be a soldier. My father used 
 to maintain that it was over-education that made him 
 so obstinate. He was for some time in the army, but 
 foun$ that he could not stand the changes of climate. 
 He then came home and entered my father's ser- 
 vice, where he remained for some years. The expo- 
 sure to wind and weather on the top of the coach 
 was too much for him, and he afterwards got a situation 
 in the Post-office. My father was willing to try and 
 promote his old servant, and exerted himself with 
 the late Duke of Newcastle, who appointed John 
 O'Mahony to his present responsible post in South 
 Africa.
 
 142 CHARLES BIANCO^!. 
 
 I give here a letter of the Duke's to my father about 
 the old Bian worthy. 
 
 " DOWNING STREET, Nov. 20th, 1863. 
 
 "DEAR MR. BIANCONI, I return to you Mr. J. 
 O'Mahony's letter, which I have read with very great 
 interest. It is full of sensible remarks, and is written 
 in so good a spirit that it is impossible not to be im- 
 pressed with a regard for the writer. 
 
 " I am glad that it was my good fortune to be able 
 on your recommendation to send out so good a colonist 
 to Natal. 
 
 " I am yours very truly, 
 
 " NEWCASTLE," 
 
 In a letter written from Natal he says, "All my 
 affections were centred in Clonmel while my father 
 lived ; since his death I could not bear to go there. 
 There are a few lines in Horace, in the sixth Satire, 
 Book I., about the 89th line, 
 
 " ' Nil me pceniteat sanum patris hujus/ etc. 
 
 " In all Horace, where there is so much to admire, 
 there is nothing that I love him for so sincerely. He 
 expresses your sentiments and mine. But he felt 
 them about a score of years before Christ was born, 
 and they will ever be proudly echoed by souls not yet 
 created." 
 
 Many years after John O'Mahony had been out in 
 Africa, when he heard of my father's death, he had a
 
 THE BIAN WORTHIES. 143 
 
 solemn requiem mass said for him. He used to call 
 my father the Rajah of Longfield, and not a bad title 
 either for a benevolent and somewhat despotic patri- 
 archal ruler. 
 
 My father used to tell the two fallowing stories, 
 which were also told me by Mr. William Barry, of 
 Bally Adam. I will give them as Mr. Barry gave 
 them to me. I can vouch for the accuracy of the first 
 one, except that I thought that the scene was laid in 
 Kilmallock. However, that matters little. 
 
 " About the year 1836," Mr. Bianconi said to me, 
 " Dan Hearn and I were at the fair in Thurles, and 
 " remaining there late, we had to put up at a carman's 
 " stage on the road home to Clonmel. On inquiring 
 " for beds and supper, we were told to step in, and have 
 " a bit to eat, though it might be doubtful whether we 
 " could get a bed. So we went in, glad to find our- 
 " selves under any shelter, as the night was wet and 
 " stormy. In a few minutes some bacon and potatoes 
 " were put before us, to which we did ample justice. 
 " Then, after a little delay, we were shown upstairs into 
 " the only spare room in the house, and in the corner 
 " of the room there was a bed. We both got into it, 
 " but found that we could not sleep. We became 
 " very restless, and we each said that the bed was 
 " very cold. At last Dan exclaimed, ' By Jove, I 
 " think there must be an iceberg under the bed.' 
 " And he put his hand under the bed as though to 
 " satisfy himself. He suddenly withdrew his hand, 
 " and with one bound he was in the middle of the
 
 144 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " room. He never waited to exchange a syllable with 
 " me, but darted down the narrow stairs into the kitchen, 
 " where a lot of carmen were drinking and smoking. 
 " Dan stood there with only his night-shirt on, and 
 " called out to me : 
 
 " * Bloody wars ! Mr. B., come down out of 
 " ' that ! ' 
 
 " I immediately jumped out of bed, and followed 
 " Dan downstairs. 
 
 " ' Did you see it ? ' said he. 
 
 "'See what?' said I. 
 
 " ' The Divil,' said Dan. 
 
 " < Where P' 
 
 " ' Under the bed.' 
 
 "At this time Dan and I were standing in the 
 " middle of the kitchen, quite unconscious of our want 
 " of clothing. Biddy Minehan, the hostess, came 
 " forward, and said to me : 
 
 " ' I had nowhere else to put it, yer honour.' 
 
 "'Put what?' I replied. 
 
 " ' The corpse, yer honour.' 
 
 " ' Good heavens ! Do you mean there is a corpse 
 " ' under our bed ?' 
 
 " * Oh, yer honour, a wake was going on when you 
 " ' came into the house and asked for a night's lodg- 
 " ' ing ; and I thought it would be hard to lose the 
 " ' chance of a few shillings, and having no spare place 
 " ' in the house, I just slipped the corpse under the 
 " ' bed.' 
 
 " I need scarcely add that Dan and I lost no time
 
 THE BIAN WORTHIES. 145 
 
 " in getting on our clothes, and departing as quickly 
 " as we could from Biddy Minehan and her corpse." 
 
 Mr. Bianconi also told me the following story : 
 
 "I once had a horse named Bobby, the best, I 
 " believe, that I ever had, and I worked him for a good 
 " many years. He was a dark chestnut, and had a 
 " white spot in the middle of his forehead. Poor 
 " Bobby was at length used up, and I had to part with 
 " him. Some months afterwards I was at the fair in 
 " Thurles, and I saw a horse so like my old Bobby, 
 " that I thought it was he, until going close up to him 
 " I observed that there was no white star on his fore- 
 " head. I asked his price, and, after a little huckster- 
 " ing, I bought him for about three times as much as I 
 " had got for Bobby two months before. I sent him 
 " home to Longfield, and the next day Dan Hearn 
 " came to see the horse. 
 
 " ' I never saw two horses so much alike in all 
 " * my life/ said Dan, with a grin on his face. ' In 
 " ' fact, sir, if you were to travel all Ireland you 
 " ' could not get anywhere such a perfect copy of 
 " ' Bobby.' 
 
 " ' Ah, .Dan ! you're out this time. I know what 
 " ' you are thinking of. It is impossible the horse can 
 " ' be Bobby, for Bobby had a white star on his fore- 
 " ' head, and this fellow has none.' 
 
 " Dan made no reply, but walked into the stable and 
 " returned with a sponge in his hand. He began to 
 " rub the horse's forehead, and to my surprise the old 
 " white star showed itself as large as ever. I took 
 
 L
 
 146 CHARLES BIAXCONI. 
 
 " care for the future never to buy a horse upon my own 
 " judgment." 
 
 It used to be as good as a play to hear my father 
 and Dan Hearn lamenting how the horses had de- 
 generated. Of course they agreed that the undefinable 
 animal, the real old Irish horse, had long since been 
 improved off the face of the earth. At one time, they 
 said, a short-legged, wide-chested beast, capable of 
 drawing any weight for any number of miles and hours, 
 and during any number of years, could be had for 6 or 
 for 10. But in an evil hour English stud-horses and 
 English gold had superseded. Broken-down hunters, 
 or blind carriage-horses, or great coarse brutes from 
 the cart, had to take the place of the ideal Irish horse 
 with legs of iron and a heart of steel. "Within my 
 recollection, they secured one animal who might be 
 considered as a specimen of an ideal Irish horse. He 
 was sold at an auction because he had killed the wife 
 of his former owner. Dan Hearn, who bought him, 
 said that five afflicted husbands were very eager in 
 their, bidding. But the brute was so incurably vicious, 
 that Dan sold him to an Englishman for 50 before 
 he had kept him a week. 
 
 Dan Hearn used gravely to say that one of his life's 
 troubles was the naming of the horses. They were, 
 when possible, called after their owners, unless there 
 happened to be too many of a name, or unless there 
 . was some special quality in the seller or in the animal 
 that suggested a name. There was one beast called 
 Miser, because his late owner was known always to drive
 
 THE BIAN WORTHIES. 147 
 
 a hard bargain; and there was one raw-boned brute 
 who was called Rampike. As a child, I remember 
 hearing fabulous tales about a certain horse named 
 Lion. He was a very fine and gigantic black horse, 
 but so wicked, that he was very difficult to manage. 
 Before he came to my father, he had killed and partly 
 devoured one man, and then his owner sold him to 
 Dan Hearn for a mere trifle. He always used to run 
 under a coach, as one of the wheelers, and while he was 
 in harness he was very willing, and acted as a sort of 
 trainer to the other horses. On one occasion, a sulky, 
 idle beast was put in beside him in the shafts, who 
 would not do his share of the work. So Lion seized 
 hold of him by the neck, and worried him as a dog 
 would worry a cat, and made him move his legs along 
 a little faster. But it was in the stable that Lion was 
 the most troublesome. There were very few men that 
 he would let approach him. He disliked my father, 
 and he disliked Dan Hearn still more. When Hearn 
 was making his visits of inspection in the stables, the 
 horse would dart forward, and sniff like a dog for he 
 was nearly blind. He would put back his ears and 
 show his teeth, and strike out wildly with his fore legs, 
 making such unearthly screeches that Hearn was glad 
 to get out of the stable as soon as he could. Lion, how- 
 ever, took a remarkable fancy to one of the helpers, 
 and with him he was as quiet as a child. This man 
 had a little grand-daughter whom he actually used to 
 bring into Lion's stall, and encourage to play with 
 him. Dan Hearn has told me how once, when the old
 
 148 CHAELES BIAXCONI. 
 
 man was ill, he saw the pretty fair-haired child lead 
 out the huge black horse, and desire him to stand still. 
 The animal obeyed her, and stood stock still while she 
 mounted on a stool, and put the harness on his head 
 and on his back, no man daring to approach him. 
 Lion lived to be a great age, always running as shaft- 
 horse in the coach, and never losing his ungovernable 
 temper. It was a puzzle with my father to know what 
 to do with him when the old helper should become 
 incapable. Happily, however, in course of time, the 
 fair-haired little girl got married to a young helper, 
 and he, through her introduction, succeeded to the 
 grand old horse's affections. 
 
 I think I recognise Lion as the large black horse 
 mentioned in Mr. Hayes' Narrative, though Mr. Hayes 
 makes him run in the car from Clonmel to Carrick-on- 
 Suir.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 SHUTS SHOP AND MARRIES. 
 
 CATHOLIC Emancipation in Ireland was soon followed 
 by the repeal of the old iniquitous tithe-laws that 
 pressed with such hateful severity upon the poor man's 
 tillage. Happily, the tithe rent-charge that succeeded 
 it is quite impartial in its operations. Municipal reform, 
 though designed in England in an unsectarian spirit, 
 had in Ireland the effect of throwing open the cor- 
 porations to Catholics. It was only when these two 
 measures had become law that the lower and middle 
 classes felt that they were truly emancipated. 
 
 The two important elections in Clare and TVaterford 
 were the direct precursors of the Emancipation Act. 
 The Waterford election, in 1826, may be considered the 
 turning point in my father's fortunes. The thousand 
 pounds he then made really enabled him to command 
 the market and establish his business on the solid 
 foundation of capitaL I think it must have been about 
 that time that he shut up his shop and threw all his 
 energies into the car traffic. It is singular how utterly 
 I have failed in finding out when and how he retired
 
 150 CHAELES BIA3TCONI. 
 
 from his gilding business. I rather think that as he 
 contemplated marriage, many of his wares found their 
 way iato his own house, and others he gave to friends, 
 or put them up in the hotels connected with his cars. 
 Very probably he allowed the looking-glass trade to 
 slacken as his car traffic increased ; but I cannot 
 satisfactorily find out how he got out of the trade. 
 Had he sold his stock by auction I should have found 
 some trace of it in the local papers. 
 
 Everybody in Ireland knows the great difference 
 between a shop and an office. The distinction between 
 classes is, in some ways, stronger in Ireland than in 
 England, and the man who owns an office considers 
 himself superior to the man who keeps a shop. It 
 was my father's intention not to marry until he had 
 attained a respectable position, until he had got 
 out of the shop and come away from behind the 
 counter. 
 
 Years before he had received great kindness from old 
 Signor del Yecchio, the patron and patriarch of the 
 Irish- Italian colony, as fine old Paolo Colnaghi was 
 the father of the London Italians. New, Mr. Del 
 Yecchio rented from my mother's father a pretty villa, 
 to which he gave the Italian name Campobello. It 
 adjoined my grandfather's own villa, and the two men 
 used often to stroll into each other's grounds on summer 
 evenings. Del Yecchio introduced his young country- 
 man, Charles Bianconi, who soon became a great 
 favourite in my grandfather's family. He there saw 
 my mother, a. little girl in a pinafore, and he has told
 
 SHUTS SHOP AND MARRIES. 151 
 
 me that he then made up his mind that she should 
 some day be his wife. Meanwhile he tossed the chil- 
 dren about in the haycocks, and was a regular visitor 
 at the house whenever he went to Dublin. 
 
 My grandfather, Patrick Hayes no relation, as I 
 have said before, to Mr. Michael Angelo Hayes, whose 
 narrative forms the fifth chapter of this book was a 
 stockbroker and a notary public. He was one of the 
 first Catholics who became a notary, and, owing to the 
 penal laws then in force, he had to serve a double 
 apprenticeship, fourteen years in all. He married 
 during his second apprenticeship, just before the rebel- 
 lion, Henrietta Burton, second daughter of an English 
 half-pay officer, Captain John Burton, who had married 
 an Irish wife, Mary Ann de Burgh, of an ancient Con- 
 naught family. My grandmother, Henrietta Burton, 
 and all her family were Protestants, but at that time 
 mixed marriages were much more frequent than now, 
 and her connections proved of great use during the 
 rebellion, when Catholics were much exposed to suspi- 
 cion. I remember seeing her, a tall stately old dame. 
 I have heard that when she married at sixteen she was 
 a fine blooming girl with a lovely voice. Of her many 
 children only four grew up. She was a woman of 
 strong common sense, and my father had the highest 
 opinion of her judgment, to which he frequently 
 deferred in family matters. Rather than have two 
 religions among her children she had them all brought 
 up in their father's faith. She was an upright, pure- 
 minded, open-handed woman, but J do not think that
 
 152 CHARLES BIAXCONI. 
 
 she ever troubled herself much about points of dogma 
 or that she sought much after abstract truth. My 
 father admired the regularity and plentifulness of her 
 household, and he was very sensible to the advantages 
 of the maternal training of so thorough a gentlewoman. 
 My mother, I have always heard, was pretty, small, and 
 dark-haired, with straight features, dark grey eyes, and 
 a fair skin, and, what my father much vaunted, beautiful 
 feet. She was a grave, gentle girl, refined and accom- 
 plished. The early death of an elder sister threw a 
 shadow over all her household, and deepened her 
 natural gravity. 
 
 When my father had got rid of his shop, and when 
 he had two thousand pounds to make a settlement, he 
 then proceeded to his deliberate wooing, and though he 
 was by no means a sentimental man, or at all capable 
 of tumbling, Irish-wise, over head and ears in love, he 
 was really actuated by soft feelings, as he afterwards 
 proved. My grandfather, though a rich man, rather 
 suited his daughter's fortune to the settlement her 
 husband could make on her than to his own means. I 
 suspect my father felt a little disappointed, but he 
 boasted that he would not lose a wife for a few hundred 
 pounds. He told me once, " It was your mother I 
 wanted and not your grandfather's money." My 
 grandfather, though his business was prosperous, and 
 he had at that time landed property and houses both 
 in and near Dublin, only gave my mother 1,200, and 
 my father made a settlement of 2,000 upon his wife 
 and children. I record this with some pride because
 
 SHUTS SHOP AND MARRIES. 153 
 
 it shows that my father was not actuated by mercenary 
 motives, though I am quite willing to admit he was 
 frequently actuated by them on other occasions. I 
 rather think he felt a little aggrieved at not receiving 
 a larger portion, and at the same time he was proud 
 that a rich man's daughter should have been freely 
 intrusted to him, and doubly proud to be able to show 
 it was the girl and not the wealth he wanted. My 
 mother, Eliza Hayes, was rather more than twenty 
 years younger than my father. They were married 
 on 14th February, 1827, in the front drawing-room of 
 my grandfather's town-house, by the late Archbishop 
 Murray, who had also christened my mother. These 
 church ceremonies in private houses were another relic 
 of the penal times when the danger attending the public 
 offices of our Church led to the custom of administering 
 sacraments in private houses instead of in the public 
 places of worship. 
 
 My father was accompanied by his intimate friend, 
 Mr. John Luther, who then and there lost his heart to 
 my aunt, though some little time elapsed before the 
 bridesmaid and groomsman went through the same 
 ceremony they were then witnessing. 
 
 After the marriage, the pair went home to my 
 father's house in Clonmel. This house opened into the 
 main street in front, and into the great yard at the 
 back. My mother was agreeably surprised at seeing 
 the fine pictures that hung on the walls in her new 
 house. She also found a profusion of that beautiful 
 cut-glass that was formerly made in "Waterford, of the
 
 154 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 finest damask linen, and silver. Glass, linen, and 
 silver are found in larger quantities in foreign house- 
 holds than in similar Irish homes. My father had, 
 too, books of fine old engravings, to which he con- 
 stantly kept adding. When he had heen alone, engrav- 
 ings and musical boxes had been his great resources of 
 amusement, and I think he learnt more from prints 
 than from any regular books of reading. Hobracken's 
 heads had certainly taught him more than any books 
 of history. 
 
 The only thing that was wanting to his house was a 
 garden. My father had failed to secure a certain pretty 
 house on the Mall, the only thing that he ever set his 
 heart upon in vain. Every summer he used to take 
 his wife to the sea, and on their way to Tramore they 
 always stopped a short time with his old friends the 
 Flemings, before both the families rejoined each other 
 at the sea-side. There was a life-long friendship began 
 between my mother and Miss Maria Fleming, whose 
 son, many years afterwards, married her niece. 
 
 My grand- parents also came down to see them at 
 Tramore. My father did not regard his wife's family, 
 British fashion, as his natural enemies ; on the con- 
 trary, he seemed to look upon them as his own kindred. 
 When my grandmother was a widow, he used often to 
 regret that she would not make his house her home, 
 and he was always delighted when she came to stay 
 any time with him. 
 
 My sister Kate was born on the 4th of June, 1828. 
 According to the Irish custom, she should have borne
 
 SHUTS SHOP AND 3IARRIES. 155 
 
 her maternal grandmother's name, but my grandmother 
 herself interposed, and declared that the little baby- 
 should bear the name of her dead Italian grandmother, 
 a little trait that deeply touched my father. She 
 was a tine strong child, and the parents had little 
 reason to apprehend her early death. As my mother 
 was not able to nurse her herself, she engaged the 
 services of a young widow, whose husband had been a 
 sergeant in the militia. Mrs. Catherine Curtain, or 
 " jJ^urse," as she was generally called, brought up all 
 my mother's children, continued on in her service 
 as upper housemaid and general care-taker in our 
 absence. She lived to see my brother's children and 
 my boy, and died only in 1872, having been in our 
 family for more than forty years. 
 
 About six years after his marriage my father con- 
 verted his Clonmel house into Hearn's Hotel, and moved 
 to the old Charter School, a quaint old Georgian 
 house with a nice farm attached to it. He changed 
 its name to Silver Spring. There he lived until he 
 bought Longfield. He tried his hand at farming ; he 
 made a pretty garden, pond, and terrace ; and during 
 the famine times set up a sort of private relief kitchen, 
 and, according to the Lombard fashion, he gave the 
 people macaroni and polenta. He got a Frenchman 
 who lived near the place to learn them how to boil 
 these messes. The Frenchman's directions for cooking 
 the polenta were not altogether bad. He said : " You 
 put him in a pot, you stir him about, and when he say, 
 'Puff, puff, puff,' you take him out and eat him."
 
 156 CHARLES BIAXCONI. 
 
 Though I chanced to be born at Queenstown, near 
 Cork, Silver Spring was my first home. 
 
 After his marriage my father's car business pros- 
 pered rapidly. He felt the " land hunger " strong on 
 him, and was nearly purchasing a nice property ; but 
 speaking to the Liberator about his plans, Daniel 
 O'Connell in a friendly way pointed out to him that 
 he could not purchase land, as he was yet an alien in 
 the country. His marriage with a natural-born sub- 
 ject, the birth of his child, his increasing business, and 
 his avowed intention of always living in Ireland, were 
 all excellent reasons for his application being success- 
 ful. The late Sir Robert Peel offered to procure his 
 naturalisation, and to have a private Act of Parliament 
 brought in for that purpose ; but the course that was 
 afterwards adopted saved this expense. 
 
 My father had a long memorial drawn out, bearing 
 date 8th of June, 1831, and addressed to the Marquis of 
 Anglesey, then Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, showing 
 how he came to Ireland, his early occupation and 
 profession there, how he became a car proprietor, how 
 the establishment had prospered, and the moral and 
 material good it did to the country, and that he had 
 thereby honestly acquired some personal fortune which 
 he was desirous of investing in the purchase of land, 
 provided that he should be naturalised and enabled to 
 make such purchases in the same manner as Her 
 Majesty's natural-born subjects, and he prayed that he 
 might be admitted to the benefit and privileges of natu- 
 ralisation under the Act of Parliament 36 Geo. III.
 
 SHUTS SHOP AND MARRIES. 157 
 
 cap. 48. In answer to this memorial, Mr. Ebbs, Clerk 
 of the Council, wrote to my father that he must 
 transmit testimonials from the principal magistrates 
 of the town or place where he resided of the facts 
 set forth in his memorial, as far as they may have 
 knowledge thereof, with any recommendations they 
 might think proper to add thereto, and that he should 
 also annex a certificate from at least one member 
 of the Privy Council, recommending the application, 
 and expressing an opinion that he was a fit person to 
 whom the license should be granted. My father got 
 all the necessary testimonials, and more than enough, 
 with which I need not trouble the reader, and finally 
 became naturalised a British subject on the 31st of 
 August, 1831. 
 
 My mother's recollections of her early married life 
 were full of political excitement, elections, patriots, and 
 all such kindred matters. My father rejoiced in having 
 people about him, and he had quite imbibed the Irish 
 notions of a proper hospitality. My mother never 
 knew what kind of people would turn in, or for how 
 many to provide food. The clergy were of course her 
 frequent visitors, and I have been much amused at her 
 impressions of famous old Father Morrissy that prince 
 of sportsmen, who used to make his sick calls when he 
 was riding across country, and whom I well remember 
 was permitted as a special privilege to retain a partly 
 sporting style of apparel, when all the other priests in 
 the diocese were made to don the Roman collar and 
 single-breasted coat. Father Cuddehy was also one of
 
 158 CHARLES BIAXOOXI. 
 
 her friends, and lie never passed by without paying her 
 a visit. My husband has told me that his father, John 
 O'Conneli, of Grenagh, was often at my father's house, 
 and how he used to say at home, " What a nice young 
 wife Bian has got." The favourable impression was 
 mutual. My father-in-law (that would have been, had 
 he lived) was a remarkably tall, fine man, not so well 
 favoured as his famous brother, but very agreeable in 
 company, though at times apt to be pugnacious. His 
 face was rather disfigured on account of a bullet having 
 passed through his cheek in one of the duels that he had 
 fought for the Cause. Mr. Fitz- Simon, of Glancullen, 
 M.P. for Dublin, who married the Liberator's eldest 
 daughter, was another guest, and his daughter after- 
 wards married my brother. It has always struck me 
 that for my father's disappointment in the failure of 
 male issue, for my brother had no son, it was some 
 compensation to him that his race should merge into that 
 of his great leader, by the marriages of his children with 
 the grand-daughter and the favourite nephew of the 
 Liberator. Priests, politicians, and patriots, who were 
 not actually either in orders or in Parliament, overran 
 my father's house in those days. He used to speak 
 kindly of some of these adventurers, whose minds he 
 did not doubt were sincere ; but he could not refrain 
 from drawing a moral of the melancholy results con- 
 sequent upon not staying at home and minding one's 
 own business. 
 
 My father still kept up the acquaintance of some of 
 his art friends of former days. His young lodger
 
 SHUTS SHOP AND MARRIES. 159 
 
 friend, Edward Hayes, had married before him, and -was 
 frequently in Clonmel. And there was a young artist, 
 James O'Neil, a protege of my father's, who had only 
 one hand, but who showed a remarkable aptitude in his 
 profession. He was painting a picture of my brother 
 and sister, but the poor fellow died before he had quite 
 finished it. My father wished to have portraits of his 
 family in his house. There was another picture of my 
 sister, done when she was a child, one of my mother, 
 and two of himself. One of these latter was so hideous 
 that my mother would not have it in the house. We 
 have also a daguerreotype, which represents him between 
 forty and fifty years of age, just as he was beginning 
 to get stout. The face is full of power, and the keen 
 eyes seem to throw out a challenge to fortune. The 
 full lips are well set, the nose is finely cut, and the chin 
 shows all the firmness of his character. 
 
 My brother, who was named Charles after his father, 
 was born on the 14th October, 1832. My father used 
 often to say what a pretty boy he was, and what a 
 pleasure it was to see him in his mother's arms. My 
 father had now almost everything that his heart could 
 desire, it is true that I was not then born, he had a 
 fond wife, a son, a pretty little daughter, he had a fine 
 business that gave him ample means, and all that had 
 clogged the youth of the alien Papist was now removed. 
 He was a free man, and was a British subject. 
 
 The year after my brother was born my grandfather 
 Bianconi died. Indeed, I fear that my father had lost 
 all recollections of his family. From when he first
 
 160 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 landed In Ireland lie had never seen them or had had any 
 concerns with them. Doubtless had he been brought 
 up at home instead of by his grandfather and uncle, the 
 family tie would have been stronger. It was through 
 the British consul in Milan that my father was traced. 
 The foreign custom ordered a division of the dead per- 
 son's property, and his few acres could not be divided 
 among his children until the fate of the missing Carlo 
 was ascertained. The English consul at Milan had 
 heard of Bianconi's cars, and it struck him that this 
 man must be the long lost Carlo Bianconi. My father 
 at once responded, but he had so lost all trace of his 
 home that he had to make many inquiries as to his 
 family. Since then he kept up a good deal of cor- 
 respondence with them. He did not in the least avow 
 any shame for having so long forgotten his people, but 
 instead he proceeded to enact the part of a benevolent 
 rich uncle. He left his small property to an orphan 
 niece, he sent money for the education of all the chil- 
 dren, he bought substitutes for all the boys in the con- 
 scription for the army, and when any one of the girls got 
 married he sent her 50. 
 
 I think his early married life was divided between 
 his cars, electioneering, Repeal agitations, and getting 
 into the corporation of Clonmel. Very little of his 
 time was passed at home, as he was rushing about at 
 least four days out of the six, and very busy in his 
 office and in the town when at home. He took 
 great pride in his children, and was very fond of 
 my mother, though perhaps in a peculiar way. He
 
 SHUTS SHOP AND MARRIES. 161 
 
 was a very good husband to her in all material points, 
 good-tempered, liberal, anxious that his wife and 
 children should have comforts and luxuries, and still I 
 do not think he ever realised the perfection of married 
 happiness, the perfect community of thoughts, hopes, 
 and wishes. He never had time for anything but busi- 
 ness, and he seemed to care for no recreation but men's 
 society. He was very fond of us all, and very good to 
 us ; he and I were more thoroughly friends than parents 
 and children often are ; still the peculiarities of his 
 foreign nature, and total absence of early domestic 
 habits, often made him less pleasant than he really 
 meant to be. My father had little need of sympathy 
 himself, and he lacked the power of helping one on 
 with the little burdens of everyday life. His head was 
 too full of his own affairs for it ever to cross his mind 
 that a woman wanted anything more than she asked for ; 
 he had no conceptions of the strain of the daily petty 
 cares, or of the dull monotony of a domestic woman's 
 life. For a man of such excellent common sense in 
 most things, he was not a judicious father. He suffered 
 my handsome brother to grow up without a profession, 
 he over-stimulated my brain in a delicate and precarious 
 childhood, until it was purely owing to the goodness of 
 God, and lots of fresh air and cold water, that I grew 
 up into a strong healthy woman, able to take care of 
 myself. I do not say this disrespectfully, but I must 
 tell the truth, and I think that men of my father's type 
 do not understand sentiment nor the good that a little 
 of it may do. 
 
 M
 
 162 CHARLES BIANCONT. 
 
 I was the third and last child of my parents. I was 
 born eight years after my brother, on the 16th of Sep- 
 tember, 1840, and I find my birth entered on the credit 
 side of my father's private ledger. I was to have been 
 christened Henrietta, after my grandmother, but at 
 her express wish I was called Mary Anne, which 
 had been the name of her dead daughter and of her 
 mother. 
 
 Once when the Liberator was staying in my father's 
 house, my father asked his advice about sending my 
 sister to school. " No, no, no," he replied. " Never 
 take her away from her mother. Get a governess to 
 assist the mother in little Kate's education, but never 
 take the child from her mother's care. The tender 
 affection of the parent educates the daughter's heart." 
 My father then made some apology to O'Connell for 
 bringing in his children. " Your time is so limited," 
 he said, " I fear they must tease you." " Your apo- 
 logy," returned O'Connell, " reminds me of my friend, 
 Peter Hussey, who was not remarkable for his polite- 
 ness. ' Dan,' he said to me once, ' you should not bring 
 in your children after dinner, it is a heavy tax upon the 
 admiration of the company.' 'Never mind, Peter,' I 
 said to him, 'I admire them so much myself that 
 I do not require any one to help me.' My eldest 
 daughter told me she was afraid I should spoil her 
 Mary. * I don't think I shall,' I said to her. * I know 
 I did my best to spoil you, my love, and I could not 
 succeed/ " 
 
 I have heard much about the snow-storm in 1834 ;
 
 SHUTS SHOP AND MAERIES. 163 
 
 in fact, " the big snow " and " the big cholera " are 
 favourite reckoning dates with the poor people. The 
 snow-storm set in one day after my father had gone 
 into town, and it was so heavy by dinner-time that my 
 mother sent in the close carriage for him. He brought 
 home a gentleman who stayed and dined with us, and 
 who refused to be driven to his house after dinner. In 
 less than half an hour he was brought back insensible, 
 and seemingly dead ; but by the aid of restoratives and 
 much rubbing, he soon came round again. Less fortu- 
 nate was a lovely country girl, a rich farmer's daughter, 
 whose cart was upset against a milestone. She was 
 much hurt in the head, and was carried into one of our 
 labourer's cottages, and there carefully tended. But 
 unfortunately, in spite of my father's advice, she was 
 removed too soon, and died within a day after getting 
 home. Our kitchen in those days was full of people 
 engaged in clearing the road to Clonmel, it was lucky 
 that there was also food for them to eat. While the 
 snow lasted my father used to send out great fatigue 
 parties to make a passage on the road, and as Jim Hal- 
 loran, one of the drivers, went with them provided with 
 a keg of whisky, by the time they had triumphantly 
 worked their way into Carrick, none of them were very 
 well able to describe their adventures. My father saved 
 a whole family, whose hut in a little dell was com- 
 pletely hidden by the drifting of the snow. Their cries 
 were heard through the chimney, and it was only by 
 stripping off a portion of the roof that the unfortunate 
 people escaped.
 
 164 CHARLES BIANCOXI. 
 
 I have already spoken of Father Cuddehy, an old 
 friend of my father's, and whom he helped to shake off 
 the robe of St. Francis, and to start on a useful 
 career as a missionary priest in America. He is now 
 the parish priest of Milford, in Massachusetts. I re- 
 ceived not long ago a letter from him which I will 
 here reproduce. I think it will sufficiently explain 
 itself. 
 
 " DEAR MRS. O'CONNELL, I received your most 
 welcome letter of 17th July, and was delighted to hear 
 that your mother, yourself, and your young son were all 
 well. I am glad to find that you are working on the 
 life of the Governor, as we all used to call your father. 
 I am sure you will find abundance of material in his 
 multitudinous and useful correspondence to make his 
 biography most interesting and instructive. The first 
 time I ever remember seeing him was about fifty-four 
 years r ago, when I^was called on as a little boy to serve 
 mass in his house at five o'clock on a fine Christmas 
 morning, though he did most of the * serving ' himself. 
 I always remember the crowd that assembled there, 
 and the circumstance that first made me acquainted 
 with him, and which was such a source of pleasure to 
 me in after life. It was under his hospitable roof 
 that I had more than one meeting with the Liberator 
 the great O'Connell, Richard Lalor Shiel, General Sir 
 de Lacy Evans, of the British Legion in Spain, who 
 came to help Otway Cave, the Liberal member for 
 Tipperary, to fight any Tory that dare insult Cave.
 
 SHUTS SHOP AXD MARRIES. 165 
 
 There I also met Dr. Madden, the historian of the 
 United Irishmen; Tom Steel; Barrett, of the Pilot; 
 Dominick Romayne, M.P. ; Judges Ball and Pigot, 
 and a host of other brilliant celebrities, who have all, 
 with the exception of Dr. Madden, long since passed 
 away from us. In fact, it was at your father's house and 
 at his hospitable board that whatever was brave and 
 liberal in politics, bold and enterprising in business, 
 was discussed, and often carried into execution, both as 
 regarding Clonmel and the county at large. It was well 
 that it was in Clonmel he took up his early residence, for 
 in no other town in Ireland could there be found at that 
 time such an independent and daring spirit of freedom 
 as in the capital of Tipperary, and which harmonized 
 so well with your father's own position ; for had Ireland 
 had anything like a legislature of its own, as we have 
 here in Massachusetts, to develop her resources, Clon- 
 mel would have been one of the most enterprising, 
 active manufacturing places in the land. And I always 
 remember what I heard O'Connell say at a meeting for 
 the Repeal : ' What better Chancellor of the Exchequer 
 could we require than my friend Charles Bianconi?' 
 It would be easy to show from the Liberator's corre- 
 spondence what a high opinion he had of your father's 
 abilities, and the work he did in his time for the 
 comfort and convenience of the people of Ireland, 
 in running cars everywhere through the land. This 
 alone would show him to have performed a service to 
 the country, second only to O'Connell himself. 
 
 " I cannot close this letter without calling to mind the
 
 166 CHARLES BIAKCOXI. 
 
 many social hours when we used to play whist with 
 your grandmother, that grand old woman, so ladylike 
 and genial, of whom I have often been reminded by 
 the strong-minded women of Massachusetts, but to whom 
 she was superior by her good sense and wisdom. We 
 who have often been at your father's house have no 
 reason to complain, for Providence has been very kind 
 to us all, and has assisted us to do our duty in our several 
 spheres, your father especially, in his long and useful 
 career, also your husband Morgan John, in his brilliant 
 parliamentary course, and your honoured mother in 
 works of charity and bringing up children and grand- 
 children. May you all long enjoy the fruits of your 
 worthy father's labours in the land he loved and 
 served so long. For myself, although I love Ireland 
 as I ever did, I thank God for sending me to a land 
 literally flowing with milk and honey. The finest, 
 freest, and most fruitful country on earth. Oh, how I 
 wish we had more of America and less of England and 
 Ireland ! "
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE MAYOR OP CLONMEL. 
 
 KING SOLOMON in all his glory never felt more proudly 
 happy in giving laws to the Children of Israel than did 
 Charles Bianconi when he ruled the little community 
 where the " Alien Papist " had once found it so hard to 
 gain a footing. The Municipal Reform Act had virtually 
 thrown open the borough to Catholics, and they hastened 
 to profit by the opportunity. The Liberator himself 
 had not disdained to accept the civic chair in Dublin, 
 and his faithful follower, Charles Bianconi, gloried in 
 his Clonmel mayoralty. I can barely remember him in 
 his chain and red robe. I think a benevolent police- 
 man once held me up in his arms to see him on the 
 bench. I have some recollections of him walking about 
 with his white wand, I suppose inspecting the markets, 
 and I remember being puzzled and half afraid as to 
 whether the police had not some sinister designs on his 
 person. 
 
 In March last year, just thirty-three years after his 
 mayoralty, I visited Clonmel, and I there became ac- 
 quainted with Mr. Thomas Dorney, my father's clerk
 
 168 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 during his term of office. Mr. Dorney kindly made out 
 for me a report of some of the proceedings that had taken 
 place, of which I will extract portions, and place them 
 before the reader somewhat in the form of a narra- 
 tive. 
 
 My father had taken a prominent part in the local 
 doings after the Corporate Reform Act in 1842, and then 
 Mr. Dorney was directed to attend every day during 
 the month of July, when two barristers, sent down by 
 the Lord-Lieutenant, were busy revising the burgess 
 roll. I here quote Mr. Dorney : 
 
 " Like every other Act passed by the British Parlia- 
 ment for Ireland, this contained a penal clause, to the 
 effect that no person could be enrolled as a burgess 
 unless he had paid that most obnoxious impost, ' Mi- 
 nister's Money,' up to the previous 31st of August. The 
 majority of the Roman Catholics refused to pay it, and 
 the wealthy members of the prescribed creed, after a 
 consultation, got up a subscription, headed by Mr. 
 Bianconi, and called upon the Protestant rector of the 
 parish, requesting him to open an office as required by 
 the Act, and to have his collector present. The clergy- 
 man was only too glad to do so. The people were then 
 directed by the leaders of the Liberal party to call at 
 the office, when I was appointed to pay the minister's 
 tax due from each person out of the funds given to me 
 for that purpose. Then each in their turn received the 
 collector's receipt, and at the revision the barristers 
 placed them on the burgess roll. The result was that 
 at the election the Liberals had a large majority."
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLONMEL. 169 
 
 The Tories were furious ; they thought they could 
 hit my father, and, through him, the whole of the 
 Liberal party. On the following Sunday the new 
 reformed corporation were to ballot for their Mayor, 
 and on the previous Friday the Tories had served my 
 father with a notice stating that as he was an alien he 
 was thereby disqualified from being a burgess. That 
 evening Mr. Dorney was sent off to Dublin by the 
 night mail coach to bring back an attested copy of the 
 Letters of Naturalisation granted to my father in 1831. 
 Mr. Dorney had a letter to Mr. Simon Creagh, a well- 
 known solicitor, who escorted him to the Castle, where 
 the attested copy was happily procured. By another 
 night journey Mr. Dorney arrived in Clonmel on the 
 Sunday morning ; he attended the meeting and pro- 
 duced the document that showed Charles Bianconi to 
 be as good a townsman as his fellows. My father was 
 placed high on the list of candidates for the mayoralty, 
 but was not actually Mayor until 1845. 
 
 On the 1st December, 1844, Charles Bianconi was 
 unanimously elected Mayor of Clonmel for the ensuing 
 year amid loud and continuous cheering. That was 
 the third time that a Catholic had filled the office. 
 He at once wrote to the Liberator for general 
 advice, and for instructions as to what law books he 
 should study, and received the following characteristic 
 letter : 
 
 " MY DEAR MAYOR, If you wish to discharge the 
 duties of the mayoralty with perfect satisfaction, act
 
 170 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 upon your own sound common sense and do not look 
 into any law book. 
 
 " Faithfully yours, 
 
 "DANIEL O'CONNELL." 
 
 I have heard many a good story of my father, after 
 he had given a decision, saying to his secretary, " Tom, 
 is that English ? " or, when he was more grandi- 
 loquently disposed, he would talk of his ignorance of 
 the English language when some one said that he had 
 put a wrong construction upon the wording of the Act, 
 or twisted the technicalities of phrase so as to suit his 
 own views. 
 
 The old corporation had made off with all the para- 
 phernalia, and the new Mayor, besides having to 
 purchase his own chain, provided a handsome stand for 
 sword and mace ; the sword was carried by Mr. Dorney, 
 who acted as sword-bearer, pursuivant, and as city 
 marshal. When other Mayors, after my father's term 
 of office had expired, had not their own chains, he 
 would hire out his to them on the condition that they 
 paid 3 to the Sisters of Charity. On the day of 
 installation the late Mayor, our good old friend Dr. 
 Phelan, alluded gracefully to my father's rise among 
 the people of Clonmel, his charity, and his love of 
 justice. Town-Councillor Bianconi was then duly 
 introduced as Dr. Phelan's successor. He got up to 
 make his speech, and when the cheering was silenced 
 he said : " Gentlemen of the Corporation, and Bur- 
 gesses of Clonmel, I feel exceedingly the burden you
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLONMEL. 171 
 
 have placed upon me, nevertheless I have great confi- 
 dence, from the morality and great public virtue of the 
 people here, that the duties of my office will not be 
 onerous. That the people of Clonmel will continue in 
 their hitherto good conduct I entertain no doubt, and 
 that they will enable me to discharge those duties for 
 their benefit and advantage (hear, hear). I shall want 
 your assistance, for we are partly in the dark. We 
 are one of the most respectable corporations in the 
 county, but our predecessors, I regret to say, did not 
 feel satisfied at our getting our turn of the office they 
 so long occupied, for when they went out of office they 
 took with them the legal books that of right belonged 
 to their successors. But I hope they will take the hint 
 and return to us those books, which are of no value to 
 them now, but would be of good service to us (hear, 
 hear). Gentlemen, I pledge myself to you that the 
 interests of the town shall have my most anxious and 
 serious attention (hear, hear). First, I shall endeavour 
 to have re-elected a market jury (cheers). Secondly, 
 it is my intention, and I give this public notice of 
 it, to weigh the bread of every baker in the town 
 (loud cheers), and I won't tell either you or the bakers 
 when or how I'll do it (laughter). Therefore, I give 
 the hint to my friends the bakers not to be too fond 
 of high profits, but to be content with small profits 
 and a large business (cheers). I shall attend to the 
 shambles also, which must be kept clean, and washed 
 out at least once a- week. My friends the victuallers 
 will, I trust, save the necessity of my adopting mea-
 
 172 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 sures on this head, which otherwise it is my inten- 
 tion, as it will be my imperative duty, to have recourse 
 to for the benefit of the inhabitants at large (hear, 
 hear). The corporation have made a code of bye- 
 laws for the government of the borough ; I shall have 
 copies of these extensively posted through the town, 
 and any person offending against them it will be my 
 duty to punish (hear, hear). To every person aggrieved 
 by the misconduct of the inhabitants, or the officers 
 under me, I shall give every redress in my power, 
 as I have accepted the office of the chief magistrate not 
 for my own sake but for yours (cheers), for in all 
 conscience I had enough already on my hands (laughter) . 
 But now that I am in office my best endeavours shall 
 be used to discharge the important duties faithfully, 
 honestly, and impartially (cheers). I have frequently 
 asserted that I have great confidence in the morality 
 and virtue of the people ; let the truth of that asser- 
 tion be carried out by you (hear, and cheers). Having 
 said so much as to what I will do, I will now tell you 
 what I will not do, and those unfortunate persons who 
 have deserted the banner of my friend Father Mathew 
 would do well to mind what I am about to state. I 
 am afraid our worthy friends, Alderman Hackett and 
 your late Mayor, allowed their kindness of heart fre- 
 quently to get the better of their duty in respect of 
 punishing those persons who were brought before them 
 charged with drunkenness. Now, I do not intend to 
 go to the police office at all on Sundays, therefore I 
 strongly advise you to keep sober on Saturdays unless
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLONMEL. 173 
 
 you want to lose mass on Sunday (laughter). I will, 
 in fact, do everything in my power to put down 
 drunkenness, notwithstanding that I see many of you 
 looking so rum at me (laughter). I pledge myself also 
 that I shall use my best exertions to establish National 
 schools for the education of the youth of the borough ; 
 that important subject shall have my first and para- 
 mount attention. In conclusion, I shall follow in the 
 footsteps of two worthy predecessors, and I fervently 
 and anxiously hope to discharge the important duties 
 conferred upon me to the satisfaction of the public." 
 (Loud and continued cheering.) 
 
 On his inauguration night the new Mayor took the 
 chair at an annual meeting of the Mechanics' Institute. 
 He was a warm supporter of the institution, and was a 
 firmer believer in its powers and virtues than many 
 modern sceptics are disposed to be. At his banquet in 
 Hearn's Hotel, he entertained the Corporation, the 
 clergy, the official townspeople, and many of the gentry 
 of the place. There were eighty guests in all. My 
 father's good-humour kept harmony amongst the some- 
 what discordant elements, for the " true blue " respec- 
 tability were there in only a small proportion. 
 
 Mr. Thomas Meagher, the then Member for Water- 
 ford, and formerly Mayor of that town (Mr. Meagher 
 was the first Catholic Mayor of the Reformed Cor- 
 poration, and this fact is recorded on a mural tablet 
 in the "VVaterford Town Hall) about this time wrote 
 to my father, touching his new office of Mayor of 
 Clonmel.
 
 174 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " I am glad to find that you are making your office so 
 truly useful as you appear to be doing. There is hardly 
 anything more essential to health and comfort than 
 well-regulated markets. You seem to have more to do 
 than I had in that respect, and also to have more 
 power. This probably is from some local Act or some 
 general Act applied to your town. The oath, I suppose, 
 is so authorised. In other respects my plan was much 
 the same as yours, to appeal to the good sense and good 
 feeling of the people to remedy any complaint detri- 
 mental to the public, and to show them how far it lies 
 in their power to do this. Besides, I used to visit the 
 markets constantly, and this, I think, also contributed 
 to keep things in order. I shall be most happy at any 
 time to give you the best opinion I can upon any 
 matter if you wish to consult me." 
 
 I will also insert here a letter of Lord Glengall's to 
 my father : 
 
 " The more I consider the subject on which we con- 
 versed lately, viz., the establishment of exchanges for the 
 public buying and selling of all species of agricultural 
 produce, the more I am satisfied of its utility and prac- 
 ticability. I have lately seen the new Corn Exchange 
 in the city of Cork, and I thus learned that the buying 
 and selling in that public market gives the greatest 
 satisfaction to the merchant as well as to the farmer. 
 I am convinced that the establishment of such a market 
 for the sale of wheat, oats, and butter in Clonmel, and
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLONMEL. 175 
 
 indeed in other towns, would be of great advantage to 
 the agricultural interests as well as to the interests 
 of the merchants. This system is adopted in almost all 
 the large towns in England, and I see no reason why 
 the same should not be the case in Ireland. To enter 
 into the details of the Cork Exchange would be beyond 
 the limits of a letter, but I am convinced that the for- 
 mation of railways will lead to a complete change in 
 the present system of purchase and selling of all agri- 
 cultural produce. 
 
 "Allow me to call your attention to the present 
 state of the burial-grounds in Clonmel, and the positive 
 necessity that exists for forming a cemetery outside the 
 town. I am in hopes of inducing the Government to 
 bring in a bill to enable parishes to take ground for 
 constructing cemeteries, and for repairing the enclosures 
 of churchyards both in towns and in the rural districts 
 by grand jury presentments. 
 
 " I remain, dear sir, yours truly, 
 
 " GLENGALL. 
 
 " The Mayor of Clonmel." 
 
 Shortly after his election my father sent out 
 circulars to the Town Council to attend him in state 
 to mass upon a certain Sunday that he had fixed 
 upon with Dr. Burke. At that time it was a mis- 
 demeanour for a Catholic Mayor to wear his robes 
 at mass. Even the Liberator used in Dublin to 
 drive to Marlborough Street in his robes, and then 
 leave them in the carriage. Mr. Dorney was very
 
 176 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 uneasy in his mind, and armed with this great 
 precedent, he went to my father and inquired what 
 was to be done with the robes and chain during 
 mass. 
 
 " I'll take care of them myself, Tom," replied his 
 worship. 
 
 Mr. Dorney then respectfully urged that such a pro- 
 ceeding would be illegal. 
 
 " Illegal or not, I'll wear them during mass. I've 
 bought them and paid for them, and if the Government 
 wish to prosecute me for wearing my own property, 
 let them do so. I cannot discover any treason in wear- 
 ing my own gold chain, the scarlet robe, or holding 
 the innocent wand." 
 
 And he fully acted up to his word. 
 
 The government authorities thought it prudent to 
 pass the matter over and say nothing about it, though it 
 was two hundred years since a mayor had gone to mass 
 wearing his robes. 
 
 On the 8th January, 1845, Charles Bianconi first 
 took his seat as Chairman at the Borough Petty 
 Sessions, assisted by two Justices of the Peace. James 
 Ryan was brought up and convicted of being drunk, 
 and tearing a constable's waist-belt. 
 
 Mayor ; " Well, Hyan, what have you to say ?" 
 
 Ryan : " Nothing, your worship ; only I wasn't 
 drunk." 
 
 Mayor : " Who tore the constable's belt ?" 
 
 Ryan : " He was bloated after his Christmas dinner, 
 your worship, and the belt burst."
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLONMEL. 177 
 
 Mayor : " You are so pleasant, that you will have to 
 spend forty-eight hours in gaol." 
 
 Michael Breen was convicted of an assault upon a 
 night watch, and ordered to pay a penalty of 7s. 6d., or 
 to be imprisoned for a fortnight. 
 
 Prisoner : " Will I get a week to pay it ?" 
 
 Mayor: "No. When any of the authorities are 
 assaulted whilst in the execution of their duties, I will 
 not allow an oflFender any indulgence. The peace of 
 the town must be preserved, and drunkenness must be 
 checked," &c. 
 
 Mary Cooney was convicted of drunkenness on New 
 Year's night. 
 
 Mayor: "I have made up my mind to clear the 
 town of characters of your description. There is not 
 one of you who is brought before me for improper con- 
 duct, that I will not commit to gaol unless you provide 
 securities to be of good behaviour for the future. The 
 town must be protected from the annoyance of bad 
 characters." 
 
 On that same day the Mayor gave a short homily on 
 petty thefts. He said : " I take this opportunity of 
 stating that I am determined, as far as I possibly can, 
 to put the law in force against those persons who are 
 in the habit of plundering straw and other property 
 from the farmers who attend our markets. I shall 
 endeavour to abate that disgraceful nuisance." 
 
 The sitting was concluded before three o'clock, and 
 at that hour the Bians used to leave Clonmel for Water- 
 ford, for Kilkenny, for Fethard, and for Dungarvau. 
 
 N
 
 178 CHAELES BIAXCOXI. 
 
 As quickly as possible the chief magistrate defied his 
 civic robes, and in a very few minutes he was engaged, 
 both by his example and by his commands, in assisting 
 his porters in the packing of the luggage on the cars. 
 
 My father was indefatigable in his exertions to 
 induce the bakers to make a uniform-sized loaf, and at 
 one of the meetings of the corporation he thus addressed 
 the court : 
 
 " Gentlemen, Since my appointment to the office 
 of Mayor, I have taken great pains to persuade the 
 bakers of this borough to make a uniform penny loaf. 
 All my efforts failed. The penny loaf averaged from 
 eight to ten ounces. I then issued a proclamation, 
 and called upon the bakers to have scales and weights 
 in their shops agreeable to the provisions of the Act of 
 Parliament, and for the public to insist upon having 
 their bread weighed. I had 500 of those proclama- 
 tions posted through the town, and being of opinion 
 that the posting of those proclamations would not 
 be of sufficient pressure, I directed the inspector of 
 weights and measures to get 1,000 copies of that pro- 
 clamation printed in quarto, and distributed among the 
 inhabitants generally (hear, hear). I am very proud 
 to have to tell you that since then the weight of the 
 penny loaf has increased from 8| ounces to 11 ounces 
 the minimum, and 12^ the maximum (hear, hear). 
 With one exception I succeeded in coaxing them when 
 I had failed in coercing them by law (laughter). The 
 exception I allude to is a baker who, under the 
 specious pretence of selling two loaves for l^f/.^ sells
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLOXMEL. 179 
 
 those small loaves to retailers, who charge the public a 
 penny, and thus in a manner defraud the public of 
 their just right " (hear). 
 
 Alderman Hearn : " It is very difficult to make the 
 bakers have a uniform-sized loaf, there being no assize 
 of bread in this town. There has been a great deal of 
 good effected by your worship, I admit ; I find the 
 benefit in my own establishment." 
 
 My father had a very great dislike to all pawnbrokers 
 and their business, and had a strong idea that they were 
 a curse to the country. " Don't you see," he would say, 
 " that wherever one of those traps is placed, public- 
 houses are always close by." He spared no pains to 
 keep the pawnbrokers strictly to the hours of business 
 allowed to them by the Pawnbroking Acts. His well- 
 meant exertions brought down upon him the anger of 
 those traders, but he invariably used to say, when this 
 fact was spoken of, "Don't you know the story of 
 water falling off the duck's back ? " 
 
 Mr. Dorney told me that although there were certain 
 men with whom my father was strict and severe, yet r 
 on the whole, he ruled the little community with equit- 
 able leniency. On one occasion he was obliged to be 
 absent from Clonmel when the court was sitting, and 
 he deputed one of the justices of the peace, an old 
 Indian officer, to take his place, saying to him, " Now 
 recollect you are to be me and not Colonel, during my 
 absence ; what I mean is, that you are not to be more 
 severe than I would be myself on offenders brought 
 before you." The colonel promised obedience; but
 
 180 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 when my father returned he asked his secretary how 
 the colonel had treated the offenders. Mr. Dorney 
 replied that there was many a poor prisoner who much 
 regretted the absence of the Mayor, and that they did 
 not at all relish the colonel. " Oh ! Tom," said my 
 father, " he's the devil ! " 
 
 My father's avowed determination to support National 
 education exposed him to sundry private innuendoes and 
 open admonitions. To the last he always used to say, 
 " There is no fear of our people when the priests do 
 their duty." Not even grand old John of Tuam's 
 anathemas could shake his fidelity to national educa- 
 tion. Still he had no notion of deserting his old friends 
 the Christian Brothers. A letter containing the follow- 
 ing paragraph appeared in the Free Press newspaper 
 at the time : 
 
 " The laudable anxiety you feel for the education of 
 the poor is well known and duly appreciated. It seems 
 from private report that you are engaged in certain pro- 
 ceedings with regard to the establishment of National 
 schools on an extensive scale in Clonmel. National 
 schools are very good things in their way, and become 
 partial blessings when no better can be had. . . . Let 
 us then, by all means, have our Catholic youth, the 
 Christian Brothers, with their admirable system of edu- 
 cation. This education is the only sure basis of human 
 improvement, and from such alone can you expect to 
 make truly good men and worthy citizens." 
 
 In answer to this letter, my father sent to the Chris- 
 tian Brothers a present of 50, and also twenty suits of
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLONilEL. 181 
 
 clothing for the most deserving of their pupils. These 
 twenty suits of clothes he continued to give them every 
 year until his death. 
 
 While I am on the subject of charities, I will quote 
 the following from Mr. Dorney's report : " During the 
 time that Mr. Bianconi was in office he was entitled 
 to certain fees, which amounted annually to about 
 60 ; and on the evening of his inauguration he sent 
 for me and said, ' Tom, am I not entitled to some fees ? ' 
 ' Yes, sir/ I replied. ' Well,' said he, ' I will not put 
 one shilling of them into my pocket, but as the guar- 
 dians of the poor refuse to provide coffins for the des- 
 titute who die outside the workhouse, it is my desire 
 that you hand over every week the amount to which I 
 am entitled to my former agent, Mr. Patrick O'^Seill, 
 and whenever a coffin is wanted, on your getting a cer- 
 tificate that the applicant cannot afford to purchase one 
 this must be signed by a clergyman, no matter of 
 what religious denomination, or by a doctor you will 
 then give an order on Marks English, a respectable 
 old mechanic, and at the end of every month get his 
 account and audit it, and then give an order on Mr. 
 O'Neill for the amount. For, as far as it lies in my 
 power, the poor of the town without difference of creed 
 shall receive a decent burial.' " 
 
 And upon another occasion the following conversa- 
 tion took place in the court : 
 
 Town Clerk : " There are some money accounts to be 
 passed to-day." 
 
 Mr. O'Brien : " What are they ? "
 
 182 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 Tmn Clerk: "There is a claim by the Mayor for 
 half a year's salary up to the 1st of July " (laughter). 
 
 Mr. Kenny: "Oh! the Mayor won't accept any 
 salary." 
 
 Mayor : " I would not take the office at all, only I 
 thought there were some pickings in it" (laughter). 
 
 Town Clerk : " I am directed by his worship to hand 
 in the amount of his salary to Dr. Burke in aid of the 
 school for the poor that is being erected in Blind 
 Street." 
 
 Mayor : " Although I do not intend to put a 
 shilling of the salary or of the fees into my pocket, 
 it does not follow that I should be deprived of the 
 pleasure of bestowing it for useful purposes; and I 
 know of none more useful than contributing to diffuse 
 the blessings of education amongst the children of the 
 poor." 
 
 One incident occurred that considerably worried my 
 father, and ruffled the prosperous smoothness of his 
 career as Mayor. The revision of the burgess roll 
 came before his court in November. His assessors 
 were Mr. Graham, a high Conservative, and Mr. 
 Hearn, a staunch O'Connellite, and a faithful follower 
 of Charles Bianconi. My father ruled that the pre- 
 mises described as " yard " did not give a qualification 
 for a vote ; and after much discussion the Mayor and 
 his fellow-assessors struck off the roll sundry candi- 
 dates, who happened to be mainly Tories. My father 
 was therefore accused of doing it for party purposes, 
 though a high Tory had joined with him in his
 
 THE MAYOE OF CLOXMEL. 183 
 
 decision. Two Tory shoemakers appealed, and the 
 Court of Queen's Bench decided that the Mayor had 
 given a wrong decision, and directed that he and his 
 assessors should be mulcted in costs. The costs, how- 
 ever, my father paid, as his colleagues had been led by 
 his misinterpretation of the Act, which he persisted in 
 setting down to his ignorance of the English language. 
 At the next meeting of the court, he made the following 
 statement : 
 
 " Gentlemen, since last we met, a very painful duty 
 devolved upon me in the revision of the burgess roll. 
 Next to trial by jury, I consider the principle of allow- 
 ing every subject who pays taxes to participate in the 
 administration of public affairs as the most important ; 
 nothing therefore could give me more pain than to be 
 coerced, from the defective state of the law, to dis- 
 franchise many respectable and useful citizens (hear, 
 hear, hear). I repeat that nothing could be more pain- 
 ful to me than to be compelled by the wording of the 
 Municipal Act, to disfranchise those gentlemen, and 
 deprive them of having a voice in the administration of 
 the municipal affairs of this borough (hear, hear). You 
 must be aware that if premises are not described on the 
 poor-rate book, singly by the name of house, warehouse, 
 counting-house, or shop, that the persons presiding in 
 the Revision Court are not in a position, from the 
 wording of the Act, to give the persons so rated the 
 benefit which, I am certain, was intended by the legis- 
 lature, and dictated by common sense (hear) ; and if 
 both parties engaged in the contest at the late revision
 
 184 CHARLES BIAKCONT. 
 
 were equally within the law in the proceedings, the 
 result would have been that the majority of the bur- 
 gesses of Clonmel, without any guilt on their parts, 
 would have been disfranchised by the absurd techni- 
 calities of the law (hear). ... I allude to this most 
 important matter with a view that the legislature may 
 have the opportunity, during the ensuing sitting of 
 Parliament, of adopting such remedies as will correct 
 the admitted evil (hear, hear). I entertain a hope that 
 every man rated at five pounds and upwards, who pays 
 his taxes and performs the duties of a citizen, will have 
 the privilege of voting at the municipal election, the 
 same as in England, unless it be intended to govern us 
 again under the old rule of divide et impera, which 
 God forbid (hear, and cheers). Gentlemen, if I had no 
 other reasons for retiring from the honourable position 
 which you placed me in, and the duties of which I have 
 discharged so feebly (no, no), the defective state of this 
 law would be a sufficient reason for my refusal of the 
 honour which public report says you intend to confer a 
 second time on me (hear, hear). The same feeling on 
 this subject actuate the assessors who presided with me, 
 and I am bound to say that it would be impossible to 
 find men possessed of more sterling honour, integrity, 
 or impartiality (hear). ... I witnessed with delight 
 an amalgamation of the good men of Clonmel of oppo- 
 site religious and political feelings, merging those feel- 
 ings into one of local and national good (hear, hear). 
 It would afford me much pleasure to see all men the 
 children of the same Deity subjects of the same sove-
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLONMEL. 185 
 
 reign fellow - Christians and fellow - citizens amal- 
 gamate together for the public local good, and the 
 advancement of the interests of the country (cheers). 
 I refuse, therefore, to continue longer than this year in 
 office, as I could not again consent to administer a law 
 so defective, a law which has a tendency to divide 
 society, and to prevent the good so much to be de- 
 sired." 
 
 About this time my father joined the '82 Club, got 
 up in memory of the Volunteers of 1782, and invested in 
 the green-and-gold uniform of the Club. This, indeed, 
 was at the Liberator's request, for Mr. Ray, his secre- 
 tary, wrote to my father, "The Liberator says he 
 expects to see you at the dinner on the 16th April 
 that we cannot spare any one to be away. You will 
 have to give an order for the suit, a grand affair, green 
 with gold for an embroidery, &c. ; it will cost about 
 15. Kohler, of Sackville Street, is making the Libe- 
 rator's and Mr. O'Connell's suits." My husband, Mor- 
 gan John O'Connell, then M.P. for Kerry, was also one 
 of the Members of Parliament who attended the great 
 demonstration and dinner in Thurles, where the old 
 Liberator had literally " raised " Tipperary, having got 
 much help from his Worship of Clonmel, whom he had 
 ordered to produce a few thousand Tipperary boys. 
 
 My father had taken a most active part during the 
 Liberator's previous imprisonment ; and on his release 
 he attended what Mr. Dorney terms " The Martyr's 
 Levee." " The great and imposing levee," says Mr. 
 Dorney, "was held by the Liberator and his fellow-
 
 186 CHARLES BIAXCONI. 
 
 martyrs in the Rotunda, May 30th, 1845. Mr. Bianconi 
 headed the Clonmel Corporation, and wore the splendid 
 green-and-gold uniform of the '82 Club under his civic 
 robes. He was warmly greeted by his friend the great 
 O'Connell, and he signed the parchment-roll, pledging 
 himself never to desist from constitutional agitation 
 until the ill-fated Union should be repealed." 
 
 At a meeting of the Corporation of Clonmel on the 
 1st December, 1845, Dr. Phelan proposed and Alder- 
 man Keily seconded the re-election as Mayor of Town 
 Councillor Bianconi ; and their addresses were received 
 with unanimous applause. 
 
 Alderman Hackett : "We are threatened with a 
 dreadful visitation, and the re-election of my worthy 
 friend will meet with our heartiest approbation." 
 
 Mayor : " Gentlemen, it is extremely distressing to 
 me at all times not to have it in my power to comply 
 with the wishes of my fellow- citizens. Your kindness 
 in my regard is most nattering to my feelings" (cheers) ; 
 " but it is impossible for me to comply with your wishes " 
 (loud cries of "No, no!") 
 
 Councillor Thomas Prendergast (Conservative) : " We 
 are determined, sir, to re-elect you." 
 
 Mayor : " It would be impossible for me to reconcile 
 to my feelings the acceptance of the mayoralty for 
 another year. I must in candour tell you', gentlemen, 
 that if you persevere in your intentions I shall retire 
 from the Council." 
 
 The entire body rose, and simultaneously cried, " No, 
 no, no ! "
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLONMEL. 187 
 
 Alderman Hackett: "I call upon your Worship to' 
 put the resolution.'* 
 The Mayor hesitated. 
 
 Alderman Kenny : "You are bound to put the reso- 
 lution." 
 
 Mayor : " I do not like to put that resolution " 
 (laughter). 
 
 Alderman Keily : " You have no alternative." 
 Mayor: " There is a regular conspiracy against me " 
 (laughter). 
 
 The resolution after a brief interval was put, and 
 carried amidst loud cheers, which were repeated lustily 
 by the people outside. ".,.. a 
 
 The Corporation were quite unanimous in their 
 wishes; and I do not think that my father's first 
 refusal was merely a nolo episcopari. I think that, as 
 his mind was then set upon the purchase of land, he 
 did not want to take the year's duty until it was actually 
 forced upon him. However, when he did undertake it, 
 so far as it lay in his power, he did his duty by the 
 starving people. 
 
 In the first month of his second mayoralty, my father 
 had to go to Dublin, and he deputed Mr. Ryan, R.M., 
 to act for him in his absence. Mr. Ryan went to the 
 office one morning before Mr. Dorney had arrived there, 
 and carried off all the official documents to the office of 
 the county magistrate's clerk, alleging that the Mayor 
 was not a magistrate. My father at once took an 
 opinion from Mr. Pigot, afterwards Chief Baron Pigot, 
 and put himself in communication with Mr. R. Penne-
 
 188 CHARLES BIANCCXNI. 
 
 father, the Under- Secretary of State. I here give Mr. 
 Pigot's opinion on the matter : 
 
 " MERRIOX SQUARE, 10*A January, 1846. 
 
 " MY DEAR SIR, I have read the documents which 
 you sent to me, relating to the jurisdiction of the 
 Mayor of Clonmel. I find that the matter is now 
 under the consideration of Government. I presume 
 you will be made acquainted with the opinion of the 
 law-advisers of the Crown. My advice to you is, that 
 you should be governed in your official conduct by that 
 opinion, whatever it may be. 
 
 " But I can by no means advise that you, or the 
 inhabitants of Clonmel, shall rest satisfied with any 
 opinion or determination of the Executive of which the 
 result shall be to deprive you and them of those weekly 
 sittings for the borough, under the presidency of the 
 Mayor as its chief magistrate, which it has now enjoyed, 
 I believe, for a period beyond the reach of living 
 memory. 
 
 "The Mayor is, unquestionably, a justice of the 
 peace, within the new municipal boundaries. 
 
 " It is competent to him, and any one or more magis- 
 trates having jurisdiction within the borough (as all 
 county magistrates of the county of Tipperary have), 
 to hold petty sessions for the borough. It is a mistake 
 to suppose that such petty sessions cannot be held, be- 
 cause Clonmel is not within a petty sessions district 
 prescribed or defined under the statute 7 & 8 Geo. IV. 
 chap. 67, or 6 & 7 "Win. IY. chap. 34. Petty sessions
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLOXMEL. 189 
 
 might have been lawfully held, and were in fact held, 
 before those statutes were passed. They were so held, 
 as I am informed, according to a usage of very long 
 standing in the borough of Clonmel. 
 
 "It is, indeed, quite plain that the borough petty 
 sessions not only were held prior to the passing of the 
 earliest of those statutes, but were purposely left un- 
 affected by the arrangements made in 1828, under 
 7 & 8 Geo. IY. chap. 67, for the district adjoining 
 Clonmel. A petty sessions district was then assigned 
 by the county magistrates, comprising portions of the 
 county contiguous to the borough, but including no 
 place within the borough, save only the county court- 
 house, in which the county petty sessions were held ; 
 and it was expressly declared, in the order or resolution 
 appearing in the book of the clerk of the peace, ' that 
 the jurisdiction of the Mayor of Clonmel shall continue 
 upon the same basis as heretofore.' 
 
 " The arrangement then made has, I understand, 
 been ever since uniformly acted on, until those pro- 
 ceedings were adopted within the last fortnight, of 
 which you have complained. The practice, I under- 
 stand, has been, that a sitting of petty sessions has 
 been held at the county court-house, for the county 
 petty sessions district, on one day of the week ; and that 
 on another day a sitting of the petty sessions for the 
 borough has been held, at which the Mayor has pre- 
 sided. 
 
 " It is, in my opinion, perfectly clear that the Muni- 
 cipal Act made no change whatever in reference to the
 
 190 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 Mayor's jurisdiction, as justice of the peace, or to his 
 competence to hold, with one or more other magis- 
 trates, petty sessions for the borough, save that his 
 jurisdiction, as such justice, is now derived from the 
 Act of Parliament and not from the Crown's Charter, 
 and that it is confined to the new municipal boun- 
 daries. 
 
 " I anticipate that the view of this subject which I 
 have here stated will be taken by those charged with 
 the duty of counselling the Executive. 
 
 " If, however, the Government shall be differently 
 advised, or if the course recently pursued in Clonmel 
 shall be persevered in, then I think immediate steps 
 should be taken by a public remonstrance from the 
 inhabitants to the Government, and by petitions to 
 Parliament, to impose upon the Executive the respon- 
 sibility, either of adopting promptly such measures, 
 whether administrative or legislative, as shall replace 
 the borough in the possession of that local jurisdiction 
 which it has so long enjoyed, or of distinctly declaring 
 that Government decline to do so. And if (which I am 
 very far from anticipating, from what I assume to be 
 the intentions and desires of those now at the head of 
 the Executive in Ireland) such remonstrance be un- 
 availing, I shall be ready to bring the whole matter 
 before Parliament ; to call upon the responsible advisers 
 of the Crown in the House of. Commons to introduce, if 
 necessary, an amendment of the law ; to propose myself 
 to Parliament a measure for that purpose, if the Govern- 
 ment shall decline to do so ; and (if it be deemed expe-
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLONMEL. 191 
 
 dient to do so) to seek an inquiry into the circumstances 
 which have led to the recent proceedings. 
 
 " I think the documents now before me should be 
 forwarded to the authorities at the Castle. They should 
 receive all the information which it is in your power to 
 afford. Copies of these documents should be kept ; as 
 it may be convenient to be prepared with them in the 
 event of a motion being made in either House of Par- 
 liament for the production of the correspondence. 
 
 " Believe me to be, dear sir, very faithfully yours, 
 
 " D. R. PlGOT. 
 ?' To Charles Bianconi, Esq., 
 Mayor of Clonmel." 
 
 The result was that the Mayor's authority was con- 
 firmed ; and the Clonmel and Carrick resident magis- 
 trates were ordered to assist him on the bench. In 
 fact, it was a complete triumph of borough over county. 
 
 About this time the line of railway running from 
 Waterford to Limerick was being planned, and the 
 promoters of it met with considerable opposition. Mr. 
 Thomas Meagher writes to my father from Waterford, 
 under date 16th September, 1844 : 
 
 " MY DEAR SIB, Mr. Billing and Mr. Thomson have 
 been with us on the subject of the railway from "Water- 
 ford to Limerick ; they are now about to visit Cork, 
 and they will take Clonmel on their way. The line they 
 propose from Waterford to Limerick, through Carrick 
 and Clonmel, has met with the unanimous approbation of
 
 192 CHARLES BIAXCONI. 
 
 our local committee. I hope you will exert yourselves 
 and unite with us in promoting it. These gentlemen 
 will explain matters to you as far as they are con- 
 cerned, and I trust you will give them every informa- 
 tion in your power. 
 
 " Believe me, my dear sir, yours faithfully, 
 
 "THOMAS MEAGHER. 
 
 "To Charles Bianconi, Esq., Clonmel." 
 
 And a few days later, Mr. Meagher writes : 
 
 " WATERFORD, 26th October, 1844. 
 
 "MY DEAR SIR, I was pleased to observe by the 
 Mercantile Advertiser, of yesterday, that you had be- 
 come a shareholder in our Waterford and Limerick 
 line. I regard your accession to our company as an 
 important evidence of its utility and safety, and at the 
 same time I am satisfied that you have consulted your 
 best interests. When I was at Clonmel addressing 
 your townsmen upon the subject, I took the liberty of 
 making an allusion to you. I do not suppose that I 
 was mistaken, and that although the result of a line of 
 railway from Limerick to Waterford may be to lessen 
 your car traffic on the main lines, yet I think that the 
 railway will give a stimulus to your cars, and that the 
 benefits will be mutual. 
 
 " As you are, therefore, embarked with us, I trust 
 you will give us the benefit of your valuable experience 
 and active co-operation, and that you will take your 
 proper share in the management of a line which must
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLOXMEL. 193 
 
 serve your future interests as much as it will be bene- 
 fited by your future individual operations I hope 
 
 that those who have taken an active part in the work 
 may hereafter see the benefits they have conferred 
 upon the country, and especially upon the poor. 
 " I remain, &c., 
 
 "THOMAS MEAGHER." 
 
 The opposition to the undertaking came from the 
 Dublin and Cashel Railway Company and from the 
 Suir Navigation Company, both, of course, trying to 
 prevent further competition against themselves. It would 
 be useless to relate that struggle here : it has now long 
 since passed and gone, and there is nothing in it that 
 calls for special comment. J will merely publish a 
 letter from Lord Glengall to my father, and the memo- 
 randum of agreement between the two rival railway 
 companies. 
 
 " DUBLIN, 16th March, 1845. 
 
 " DEAR SIR, Many thanks for your enclosures. Mr. 
 Meagher's letter is very satisfactory. Though absent, 
 I have friends working for us in a particular quarter 
 which will serve us when the day of difficulty comes. 
 I think we shall succeed "after much trouble ; but trouble 
 is a thing upon which I always calculated and laid out 
 to overcome long ago. The standing orders is the 
 great danger ; there our opponents worry us at small 
 cost. 
 
 " The river Suir from Clonmel to Carrick is only fit 
 o
 
 194 CHAKLES BIANCONI. 
 
 for mills and for fish ; and this will be seen after the 
 railway from Clonmel to Waterford has been open a 
 year. The export trade will break down on the river as 
 the import trade must naturally come up by the railway, 
 we lowering our tolls and charges so as to smash the horse 
 line. I see no reason to make a secret of a plain fact. 
 " Yours truly, 
 
 " GLENGALL." 
 
 " GREAT SOUTHERN AND "WESTERN KAIIAVAY COMPANY, 
 
 " COLLEGE GREEN, DUBLIN, 29th March, 1845. 
 
 " WATERFORD AND LIMERICK EAILWAY COMPANY, 
 
 AND 
 GREAT SOUTHERN AND WESTERN RAILWAY COMPANY. 
 
 " At a'meeting between a Deputation of the Waterford 
 and Limerick Railway Company and the Directors of 
 the Great Southern and Western Railway Company, 
 it was agreed that all the terms as proposed by the 
 Great Southern and Western Railway Company to Mr. 
 Hunt in London, on the 15th day of March last, shall 
 be consented to by the Waterford and Limerick Rail- 
 way Company, and that every straightforward and 
 honest support shall be given by each company for the 
 purpose of supporting the bills of the other as recom- 
 mended by the Board of Trade. 
 
 " Signed, THOMAS MEAGHER, 
 WILLIAM MONSELL, 
 Jos. W. STRANGMAN, 
 CHARLES BIANCONI."
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLONMEL. 195 
 
 The line was made, but it did not prosper. For many 
 years it was a bad speculation for its shareholders, 
 though I believe it is now in a better condition. It 
 was not merely to get an interest for his money that 
 my father took an interest in the new railway ; he was 
 thoroughly imbued with the notion that traffic, traffic, 
 and more traffic must be good for the welfare of a 
 country. Never was there a man who had a greater 
 horror of inactivity and want of energy, or who had a 
 greater idea of the value of the means of locomotion. 
 He well recollected the tedious journeys on Tom 
 Morrissy's boat between Clonmel and Waterford, and 
 he also recollected, perhaps still better, his shoulders 
 aching with the weight of his pedler's pack as he had 
 slowly trudged along the road. He used to say some- 
 times that the Bians grew out of his shoulders. He 
 was, I think, one of the first to perceive the advantages 
 from railway traffic, and he at once gave way to what 
 he saw was inevitable. As the railways broke up his 
 great lines, he would run cars to meet them at the 
 stations where the trains stopped. 
 
 My old friend Dean Kenny, of Ennis, frequently met 
 my father at the Imperial Hotel in Dublin, and he has 
 told me that on one occasion, when sundry coach and 
 canal-boat proprietors met together in the Imperial 
 Hotel, they were discussing and laying plans as to how 
 they could oppose Mr. Drummond's great central rail- 
 way scheme. My father, who sat still all the while 
 listening to their ideas and their plans, said at last : " I 
 think I know as much of the country as any gentleman
 
 196 CHAELES BTANCONI. 
 
 in this room, and I look upon it to be as foolish to try to 
 prevent the establishment of railways as to try to stem 
 the Liffey. My own loss by the establishment of railways 
 would be greater than that of any gentleman here 
 present, I may almost say greater than the combined 
 losses of all the gentlemen here present. Still I see 
 that railways must be made, and I not only do not oppose 
 them, but I have taken shares in the undertakings." 
 
 My father was a great apostle of traffic, and it was 
 his constant wish to procure the means to the poorer 
 classes of travelling themselves, and of getting their 
 goods home to them as cheaply as possible. He was 
 a man sometimes hard in business matters, exacting an 
 eye for an eye, and therefore not likely to allow false 
 philanthropy to run away with him ; but whatever his 
 faults may have been, he was sincere in his desires to 
 assist those who were willing to assist themselves. 
 
 I will conclude this chapter by a humorous letter 
 from the Liberator to my father ; I cannot say, how- 
 ever, whether the application was successful. 
 
 "To 
 " THE EIGHT WORSHIPFUL THE MAYOR or CLONMEL. 
 
 " Mr. John O'Farrell, who is already most favourably 
 known to many of the directors of the Waterford and 
 Limerick Railway, and who possesses every quality that 
 renders a man respectable in character and trustworthy 
 in conduct, seeks for the professional appointment of 
 engineer to the company. He will be strongly sup-
 
 THE MAYOR OF CLONMEL. 197 
 
 ported by the Mayors of "Waterford and Limerick ; and, 
 I, the late Lord Mayor of Dublin, command you, foreign 
 carman, and worthy Mayor of the central town of 
 Clonmel, to give him your support, vote, and interest, 
 and by your so doing you will much oblige your sin- 
 cere and affectionate friend, 
 
 " DANIEL O'CONNELL."
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE NATIONAL BANK, AND THE HELPING HAND. 
 
 IN 1835 Daniel O'Connell founded and established the 
 National Bank in Ireland, and of that bank he was the 
 founder, the patron, and the governor. It was intended 
 to be especially a poor man's bank, got up for the pur- 
 pose of enabling the lower classes to invest their small 
 savings, and thus get a small interest for their money, 
 instead of trusting their pound- notes to the fortunes of 
 an old stocking, a cracked teapot, or even a hole in the 
 thatch. These expedients for saving money were not 
 uncommon, and those who were a little more enlight- 
 ened used frequently to hand over their money to a 
 friend to " keep safe" for them. Even I, born five years 
 after the National Bank was first established, have been 
 asked by people to take charge of their little hoards. 
 And in the old days there were many traders, like my 
 father's old friend Mary Kirwan, who used to gain con- 
 siderably by the small sums intrusted to them, of which 
 they were allowed to keep the interest. 
 
 The few banks that were then in the country were 
 mostly private speculations of old Protestant families
 
 NATIONAL BANK, AND THE HELPING HAND. 199 
 
 of position, and the gentlemen who managed these 
 banks only too often used their influence in political 
 and in religious matters. However, I must say that 
 the fine old Tory gentlemen, the Messrs. Ryall, stood 
 most nobly by my father in his early struggles, as he 
 himself has recorded. 
 
 I will here quote a short passage from Fagan's " Life 
 of O'Connell " : " O'ConnelTs reason for thus connecting 
 himself with the banking system of the country was 
 because of the monopoly the religious monopoly 
 carried out in the management of the Bank of Ireland, 
 and because of the political influence exercised by that 
 establishment." Men's motives in establishing a bank, 
 as in other undertakings, are generally mixed, and I 
 think Mr. Fagan is wrong in only attributing to the 
 Liberator the desire to establish a counter leverage to 
 the Conservative banking interest in the country. . And 
 I must more directly contradict Mr. Fagan, for I do 
 not believe that such was the Liberator's main 'reason. 
 My father was so deeply in the Liberator's confidence 
 that I may almost style him his financial father con- 
 fessor, and he has frequently told me that'O'Connell's 
 object was to induce the people to put up their savings 
 in a rational manner, and to enjoy the advantages of 
 access to ready money. To get Irish rural capital out 
 of the old stockings, or the holes in the thatch, and to 
 have it circulated through the country instead of lying 
 dormant, was what he always believed to have been the 
 great man's chief aim. Doubtless, not to let his op- 
 ponents, the Tories, have the battle all their own way
 
 200 CHAELES BIANCOXI. 
 
 was an argument with him, but it was no more than an 
 argument. Daniel O'Connell knew the people of Ire- 
 land thoroughly ; he had that intense sympathy with 
 them which is not uncommon, though in a lesser degree, 
 with other Celtic landlords. My father firmly believed 
 that to benefit the actual tiller of the soil was the Libe- 
 rator's chief motive in establishing the National Bank 
 of Ireland. Any one who saw how he allowed his 
 tenants to split up their farms to enable their children 
 to marry and settle at home, and how he allowed unfor- 
 tunate evicted creatures to squat on his land at Beg 
 Darrynane, would have perceived how the man's large 
 heart was moved to endeavour to benefit materially the 
 people that were around him. Those who did not know 
 him intimately were apt not to consider his great sym- 
 pathy for his suffering fellow- creatures, and to over- 
 look how this sympathy influenced all his views and his 
 actions. 
 
 When the Liberator got his charter and started the 
 Poor Man's Bank, patriots, lay and clerical, hastened 
 to take shares, and in some instances to set up sister 
 institutions. Clonmel was an intensely patriotic town, 
 and a rich town, too, before the railway came and left 
 it in a corner, to be approached only by cross lines. 
 Some enterprising Catholics availed themselves of the 
 National Bank Charter to set up affiliated, though 
 practically independent, branches. Charles Bianconi, 
 an O'Connellite, and beginning to be a rich man, was 
 naturally a prime mover in the scheme. Never, per- 
 haps, was there a man who thought more of turning
 
 NATIONAL BANK, AND THE HELPING HAND. 201 
 
 his money. He would sooner lose a lump sum than lose 
 the two or three days' interest upon an investment. 
 Truly, he was a worthy scion of that Lombard race who 
 invented bills of exchange, for financing was a positive 
 passion with him. A peculiarity of the new institution, 
 and certainly one calculated to test its staying powers, 
 was that most of its early managers were chosen because 
 they were respectable and patriotic Catholics, mer- 
 chants, gentlemen-farmers, men who knew nothing 
 about banking as a business, but who managed to com- 
 bine it with their every-day pursuits, and who had to be 
 supplied with a sort of dry-nurse in the person of a 
 skilled assistant, in whose hands undue powers became 
 practically vested. Some of these gentlemen certainly 
 got on admirably ; perhaps it is peculiar to Irish 
 people to possess a general adaptability for doing work 
 that they are not intended to do. However, after a 
 time the Clonmel Bank, with the Cashel and Thurles 
 branches, gave up its separate existence, and became 
 incorporated with the original National Bank. 
 
 The following letter is from my father to the late 
 Dr. Leahy, who afterwards became our revered arch- 
 bishop. 
 
 " KINGSTOWN, IZrd September, 1843. 
 
 " MY DEAR SIR, To show you that I am not an 
 " idle spectator of the position of our country, I will 
 " give you the statistics of the stock of the National 
 " Bank of Ireland, of which I have been a Director of 
 " the Clonmel branch since its opening
 
 202 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " The National Bank commenced in 1835, and has a 
 " capital of 20,000 shares of 50 each, on which 
 " 17 10s. has been paid. Its paid-up capital is, 
 " therefore, 350,000. Its constitution is that all 
 " persons having five shares have one vote, twenty 
 " shares two votes, sixty shares three votes, a hundred 
 " shares four votes. 
 
 " In 1836 there were 246 shareholders having votes, 
 " of which only 43 were Irish. Now in 1843 there are 
 " 481 shareholders having votes, of which only 106 
 " are English. Clonmel alone possesses between 
 " 20,000 and 30,000 of the capital of this bank. 
 " This is correct, and if necessary, I can give you 
 " further particulars. 
 
 " I am yours very truly, 
 
 " CHARLES BIANCONI." 
 
 I will now give in fall the Liberator's Address to 
 the People of Ireland, made on the occasion of the run 
 on the bank in 1836. I quote this at length because 
 it so exactly confirms my father's theory about his 
 great leader's object in founding the bank. There 
 breathes through every line of it the man's intense 
 desire to see our people a steady and a prosperous race. 
 Lavishly generous as he was, almost despising money for 
 its own sake (and let me say here that few things vexed 
 my father more than to hear people insinuate that 
 Daniel O'Connell was actuated by mercenary motives), 
 he could see ho.w our people lacked all the steady virtues 
 which are exemplified in having a balance at one's
 
 NATIONAL BANK, AND THE HELPING HAND. 203 
 
 banker, the first step towards which is to have the 
 banker. 
 
 " TO THE PEOPLE OF IKELAND. 
 
 " NATIONAL BANK OF IRELAND, 
 
 " Office, DAME STREET. 
 
 DUBLIN, 22d Nwembtr, 1836. 
 
 " Whilst the run for gold continued on the National 
 Bank, of which I am Governor, I was often asked by 
 friendly persons, unconnected in interest with our 
 establishment, to use the influence which the people of 
 Ireland allowed me to possess, to put a stop to the 
 unusual demand for gold in lieu of National notes. I 
 refused to do so. I refused to interfere until the 
 demand should have ceased, and until the National 
 Bank had practically proved its readiness and punc- 
 tuality by paying every demand made upon it, 
 
 " I did, indeed, think that the people of Ireland 
 ought of themselves to have shown that confidence in 
 me, and to have testified their conviction that I would 
 not be one to circulate amongst them any paper which 
 could cause any loss or injury to anybody. But I 
 would not complain, nor do I now complain ; I am 
 only grieved that the people should injure themselves 
 by striking down prices, and should deprive the farmers 
 of good markets, and take away from almost everybody 
 the means of giving employment to the labourer and to 
 the poor. 
 
 " The three last years have been years of low prices,
 
 204 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 and of great difficulty for the industrious classes to pay 
 their rents, and to sustain the heavy burdens which 
 have pressed upon them. This season, on the contrary, 
 opened well, there was a remunerating price for every- 
 thing, when a foolish panic seized a number of persons, 
 and they, most senselessly and culpably, made a run 
 on the banks. It did, indeed, afflict me much to see 
 people thus injure themselves. It also grieved me to 
 see that the Irish people, intelligent though they be, 
 did not understand the security against any ultimate 
 loss which arises from the constitution of a joint- stock 
 bank, where every shareholder is liable to the full 
 extent of all his property. Every bank-note is in the 
 nature of a judgment debt, and binds all the real 
 property of the shareholder. This I tell you as a 
 lawyer, and I pledge my professional credit there- 
 upon. 
 
 " For example, the Agricultural Bank has ceased to 
 pay its notes with banking regularity. I am sincerely 
 sorry for it, for it was a kind and a useful bank to the 
 farmers and traders. 
 
 " I have no sort of connection whatsoever with that 
 bank, or with the respectable class of persons who are 
 its shareholders. But I am bound to tell the people 
 that I am perfectly convinced that every single note of 
 that establishment will be ultimately paid in full, and 
 I declare it my opinion that no man should part with 
 an Agricultural note for less than its full value. 
 
 " I have, I repeat, no connection with the Agricul- 
 tural Bank, neither have I with the Provincial Bank ;
 
 NATIONAL BANK, AND THE HELPING HAND. 205 
 
 but I know that the Provincial Bank is a very wealthy 
 establishment. I know that its shareholders in London 
 are extremely opulent. I know that the people are 
 perfectly safe in taking and in keeping Provincial 
 notes, and that it is folly, and in fact great wickedness, 
 to make any run on that bank, because it would inter- 
 fere with its directors in their readiness to accommodate 
 farmers, merchants, and traders, and thus keep down 
 prices and prevent trade and employment. 
 
 " I say these things of the Provincial Bank without 
 having had, directly or indirectly, any communication 
 with any person connected with that establishment. It 
 really is so solvent an establishment that its share- 
 holders may perhaps smile at my seeming to uphold 
 their credit. They mistake me ; it is not for their 
 sakes, it is for the sake of the people of Ireland that 
 I write. It is to warn the people against being their 
 own enemies by preventing the Provincial Bank from 
 discounting bills, and advancing money to the indus- 
 trious classes of society. 
 
 " With respect to the Bank of Ireland the Govern- 
 ment bank I beg leave respectfully to thank their 
 directors for the liberality with which they have come 
 forward to sustain public credit. 
 
 " I do not know of greater madness than that of the 
 people who made a run for gold on some of the branches 
 of the National Bank; it was sheer insanity, again 
 striking down the prices of their own commodities and 
 taking away the means of employment. It is not 
 merely as Governor of the National Bank of Ireland, it
 
 206 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 is as one, alas ! of the oldest and steadiest friends of 
 Ireland that I address you ; as the friend of the people 
 I call on them to allow the banks to do them good. 
 
 " I instituted the National Bank merely to do good 
 to the people of Ireland. I call on them to assist me to 
 serve themselves. Every shilling of property I have in 
 the world, all the property of my eldest son and of his 
 family, all the property of my son-in-law, is involved 
 as security for the notes of the National Bank, together 
 with the property of all other shareholders. The run 
 has now ceased and the demand is over ; I only ask the 
 people to return to the tranquil enjoyment of those 
 advantages which I sought to secure to them by estab- 
 lishing the National Bank. 
 
 "I cannot conclude without candidly confessing 
 that several Conservative landlords have come forward 
 to sustain public credit, and have sunk all considerations 
 of angry politics in order to do public good. This is a 
 kind and right feeling which ought to be cultivated 
 and encouraged at every side and by everybody. 
 
 " I think I deserve the confidence of the people. I 
 call on them to confide in me and to follow my advice. 
 No man can be injured by doing so, every man will be 
 the better for taking the advice, in this instance, of 
 " Your devoted friend, 
 
 "DANIEL O'CONNELL, 
 " Governor of the National Bank of Ireland." 
 
 During these years my father was obliged to make 
 periodical visits to London, and I will here give
 
 NATIONAL BANK, AND THE HELPING HAND. 207 
 
 an anecdote which shows very truly one of his 
 peculiarities. 
 
 One day, in Fleet Street, just after he had engaged 
 a four-wheeled cab, my father saw a stout gentleman 
 walking very quickty towards him who was evidently 
 in distress at not being able to find a conveyance. The 
 spirit of Charles Bianconi, carman, woke up within 
 him too strongly to be suddenly quelled. " I have a 
 cab, sir," he said. " If you will give me your fare I 
 will set you down where you like." The stout gentle- 
 man was profuse with thanks, and said he wanted to 
 go to the Exchange. When they were in the cab he 
 begged to be allowed to know to whom he was indebted. 
 " My name is Bianconi," said my father. " The great 
 Bianconi ? " replied the gentleman. " And what is 
 your name, sir ? " replied my father, without half the 
 politeness of his companion. " My name, sir, is Roths- 
 child." My father, in telling me the story, admitted 
 that he was so much overawed by the presence and by 
 the affability of so famous a man that he had not the 
 presence of mind to return his compliment and say, 
 " The great Rothschild ? " 
 
 This was by no means a singular instance of my 
 father's eccentricities in this way ; often at home, in 
 Ireland, when he was driving in his own carriage 
 along the high road, he would take in a traveller who 
 would otherwise have gone by the car, provided that 
 he paid the car fare. 
 
 Man is often a strange creature, and some of my 
 father's oddities were assuredly of the strangest kind.
 
 208 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 That he was a good and charitable man nobody who 
 knew him will, I think, deny. He was the most helpful 
 man, but his help was too often given in a very dis- 
 agreeable manner. He did not mind having his own 
 corns trodden on, if, indeed, in the metaphorical sense, 
 he had any, but never was there a man more certain to 
 stamp upon his neighbour's toes. He took a positive 
 delight in trying to set people's affairs straight for 
 them, but his remedies were of so violent a nature that 
 any one who had force of will to submit to them would 
 never himself have got into trouble. His assistance 
 was very frequently in the form of a bill at three 
 months, or a credit for so much at the National Bank. 
 Even after he had ceased to be a shareholder in the 
 bank, he regarded it with a sort of paternal fondness, 
 and I suppose he considered that interest for cash 
 was a sacred rite of which Mammon should not be 
 defrauded by any favoured worshipper. Otherwise I 
 cannot imagine why he exposed people of limited, 
 though of certain income, in whose integrity he firmly 
 believed, and whom he respected and was fond of, to 
 the annoyance and the expense of bills and renewals. 
 
 My father was perpetually getting situations for 
 people. To my own knowledge three managers of 
 National Banks have owed their appointments to him. 
 One was the son of a car agent, and another the son of 
 an old friend who had been kind to him in former days. 
 I find their letters to him telling him of their successive 
 promotion carefully put away, and plainly bearing 
 traces of having been carried about in his pocket. And
 
 NATIONAL BANK, AND THE HELPING HAND. 209 
 
 other letters of his, written by people to whom he had 
 rendered some service, show evident signs of having 
 been long kept in his pocket. I suppose he cherished 
 them in some sort of way, and liked to keep them close 
 to him for a certain time, until he stowed them away 
 into his cupboard. He procured matronships for at 
 least two ladies ; he used to get appointments for the 
 head boys from the Christian Brothers' schools into 
 warehouses and railway offices. Two or three times he 
 heard from the Jesuits of clever boys without means to 
 begin a profession, and to them he advanced money, or 
 opened a credit for them in a bank. As to the girls 
 that he got cheaply into convent schools, the boys into 
 shops, offices, banks, and model schools, their number 
 would be legion. And he never forgot anybody whom 
 he had once befriended. At different times he helped 
 to get deserving young men into the Catholic priest- 
 hood. He partly paid for the education of one clever 
 young lad of good parentage who remembered no 
 home but the workhouse, and who told me, only last 
 summer, that he was going abroad to complete his 
 studies for the church. My father, too, had a sort of 
 genius for worrying people in authority into assisting 
 young people to make their start in life. But his 
 helping hand never went so far as when he worried 
 that most excellent and kind-hearted nobleman, Lord 
 Carlisle, into giving a good living to a clergyman of 
 the Church of England. My father used to take a great 
 interest in his proteges, and would be very vexed if 
 they did not do him credit. Two letters of Cardinal 
 
 P
 
 210 CHARLES BIAXCOXI. 
 
 Cullen's to him relate to grumblings of my father's 
 about a boy who spelt badly ; and this from Charles 
 Bianconi who could hardly be taught how to spell 
 " money " ! His finger was in every man's pie, and 
 in many a woman's pie, too, for the old man was 
 not averse to a bit of match-making. He gave 
 1,000 to a young relative who married the descen- 
 dant of one of his early benefactors. 
 
 The bullion trade in which my father was engaged 
 in his early days, and of which I have already spoken, 
 opened out to him chances for other money transac- 
 tions. He used to lend money at interest, and of 
 this he made no secret. He never charged usurious 
 interest, or laid himself out specially for money deal- 
 ings as a trade, but when he began to realise capital 
 during "the years that he was yet an alien, and could 
 not accomplish his cherished hope of buying land, he 
 used to lend! out his money on the security of land, and, 
 from what I have discovered in looking over his papers, 
 usually at five per cent, interest. He never was a pro- 
 fessional bill discounter, but, like most tradesmen at that 
 time, he was always ready to " do " a bill for a solvent 
 customer ; and if he had not taken stamped paper in 
 exchange for goods he would, indeed, have made sorry 
 bargains with the Irish gentry of sixty years ago. I 
 repeat that my father made no secret of his money 
 dealings. He was not a professional money lender, 
 though he lent a good deal of money in a fair and 
 honest manner and at an equitable rate of interest ; 
 aud I am bound to add, with all the love and respect
 
 NATIONAL BANK, AND THE HELPING HAND. 211 
 
 that I had for him, that the instinct of turning his 
 money was so strong in him that he has charged me, his 
 own daughter, his special confidante and friend, five per 
 cent, interest for money lent. My husband once said 
 to him in joke, though with a mock earnestness as 
 though he believed it, " "Well, Governor, did you really 
 make the Liberator's acquaintance upon a bit of stamped 
 paper ? " 
 
 The veneration and the love that my father had for 
 Daniel O'Connell was almost unbounded, and this was 
 the more singular as the natures of the two men were 
 so wholly opposite. Permeated to the core as my father 
 was with all Poor Richard's axioms and wise saws, it 
 is astonishing that he could ever have respected a man 
 for allowing his liabilities to get beyond his immediate 
 control. Yet the Liberator's too open-handed genero- 
 sity, that once left him in galling, though only tempo- 
 rary, difficulties, sank deeply into my father's naturally 
 warm heart. He and two other gentlemen undertook to 
 set O'Connell' s affairs straight for him. They saw that 
 his income was large enough to meet the demands with- 
 out sacrificing even a single farm. My father cross- 
 questioned O'Connell about the details of his property, 
 and about his liabilities to the bank, and, unlike most 
 men in difficulties, O'Connell concealed nothing nor left 
 any secret untold. My father put his questions as 
 delicately as he could, but he has said that he never 
 suffered more acutely than in seeing the Liberator 
 wince and so plainly show his sorrow. He, however, 
 made a bargain, and a very wise one, too, in dealing
 
 212 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 with my father, that he was not to be bothered about 
 the matter until it was all settled. At length the happy 
 day arrived. My father called upon his friend and 
 found him standing writing at his high desk. He did 
 not at once begin to talk about the matter, but held 
 the bank-book in his hands, and he could see O'Connell 
 occasionally looking askance at the little vellum-bound 
 volume, pretty much as a child eyes his spelling-book. 
 
 " Well, Liberator," my father said, " won't you take 
 a look at your bank-book ?" 
 
 The question did not make a pleasant impression, 
 and my father was obliged to open the book and point 
 with his finger to the sum total, showing a fair balance to 
 the credit of Daniel O'Connell, Esquire. My father has 
 said that he never would forget the expression that was 
 then upon his friend's face. After a moment's bewilder- 
 ment, O'Connell lifted up his eyes to the big crucifix 
 that hung over his desk, took off his cap, and said in a 
 low and reverent tone, " Thanks be to God ! " Never was 
 my father so much astonished as he was then at seeing 
 O'Connell thus raise his thoughts to heaven before he 
 had verified the accuracy of the figures. No man ever 
 recognised more heartily than my father, that though 
 he had toiled and planted, it was God who had given 
 him his good things, yet he must have worked out the 
 account for himself, and seen that it was correct before 
 he could thus reverentially express his gratitude. 
 
 I will conclude this chapter by a letter of my father's, 
 that I may call Dick Whittington's advice. It was 
 written to the son of one of his early benefactors :
 
 NATIONAL BANK, AN1) THE HELPING HAND. 213 
 
 " DEAR , I am obliged for your letter, and T 
 
 " am delighted at your arrangements, particularly at 
 " your determination not to change, and the more so as 
 " you will now have a first-class school for your boys. 
 " For means you are all right, and as long as you are 
 " living, you will want nothing. 
 
 " I remember when I was earning a shilling a day 
 " in Clonmel, I used to live upon eightpence, and that 
 " did not prevent the people from twice making me 
 " their Mayor. I did the same at Cashel and at 
 " Thurles, and that does not prevent me from at 
 " present living between the two towns on a property 
 " of seven miles' circumference, and on which I pay 
 " her Majesty 7 2s. 6d. per year, or from being a 
 " J.P. or a D.L. 
 
 " It gives me sincere pleasure in seeing you follow 
 " the sound principle -of having your wants within your 
 " means. Don't be fond of changes. It is better for 
 " you to be at the head of a small republic than at the 
 " foot of a great one. 
 
 " I shall always be happy to hear of your welfare, 
 " and with best wishes, 
 
 " I am, yours faithfully, 
 
 "CHARLES BIANCOXI." 
 
 I may add as a postscript what my father once said 
 to a young Yorkshireman : " Keep before the wheels, 
 young man, or they will run over you. Always keep 
 before the wheels."
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 
 
 THIS chapter, that was to have been written by my late 
 husband, Morgan John O'Connell, would, had death 
 spared him, been one of the best in this poor book, but 
 now, undertaken by me, it will, I fear, be one of the 
 worst. It was to have been my husband's special and 
 chosen task. The wide experience that he had gained 
 from forty years of Irish politics and during nearly half 
 that time he sat in the House of Commons his intimate 
 knowledge of men and measures, the genial wit and 
 playful humour that ran along so pleasantly through all 
 his speech and in his letters, which pleasantness now 
 makes my eyes wet, would have made this chapter far 
 more interesting than I can hope to make it, and would 
 have given it a force such as I cannot expect to achieve. 
 As a young man my husband had, nearly every year, 
 spent many pleasant weeks in County Tipperary. 
 There was hardly a political house of our faction in 
 the county where the handsome, gay member for Kerry 
 was not a welcome and a frequent guest, so that he had 
 direct and personal knowledge of parliamentary elec-
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 215 
 
 tioneering in Ireland. I fear that I am powerless to 
 do justice to the points in my father's career that I had 
 most set my heart upon making worthy of the man ; 
 to show how, in the prime of his life, he gradually grew 
 into an Irishman, and to explain the working of his 
 heart and soul in Irish politics. I have already men- 
 tioned how he would playfully allude to his early days, 
 " While the big and the little were fighting together, 
 I grew up amongst them." 
 
 Unfortunately, I have never seen an Irish election. 
 I should have liked, above all things, to have been an 
 eye-witness to one of those exciting scenes which have 
 now, perhaps happily, become more peaceable since the 
 introduction of the Ballot. My mother had a horror 
 and a dread of contested elections, and she objected 
 very strongly to any woman going near the hustings, 
 so I had to curb my desires, and trust to my father and 
 to my husband for their second-hand reports. My 
 father came home one day with a great gash on his fore- 
 head, and remarked very coolly that had the stone hit 
 him an inch higher, he would, instead of walking, have 
 been carried home on a shutter. My mother was pro- 
 bably quite right in not allowing me to go outside the 
 gates while these scenes were going on. To her a con- 
 tested election meant mobs of excited patriots, secret 
 conclaves everywhere, great piles of food in gentlemen's 
 houses ready for any one who would come in and 
 eat ; loud and eager voices over the post-prandial punch, 
 priests rushing about in all directions amid the scream- 
 ing, the stick brandishing, and the stone-throwing of a
 
 216 CHAELES BIAJfCONI. 
 
 furious crowd, which every hour became more frantic 
 by additional glasses of whisky. Irish elections cer- 
 tainly have not been without violent angry riots on 
 the part of the mob against the Ascendancy party, and 
 perhaps in Tipperary the contest has usually been 
 fiercer than elsewhere. Still, my father unquestion- 
 ably enjoyed the battle. I rather think that the 
 many years he passed as a voteless man tended to 
 make him doubly prize the acquired privilege. In 
 Ireland, before the days of the Emancipation Act, 
 religion and politics were very closely allied, and it 
 was only by means of the Catholic Association that he 
 was brought into the charmed circle of Irish political 
 life. 
 
 Then later on, by means of his cars, he became an 
 electioneering agent on a large scale. I have already 
 told how, in the great Waterford election of 1826, he had 
 let his cars to the Tory party, and then when he found 
 them overturned in the streets, and made use of as bar- 
 ricades to prevent the Liberal party, then really begin- 
 ning to rise and have a power of their own, from com- 
 ing to the poll how he then broke off his engagement 
 with the Tories, and went over to the Liberal cause. 
 He never again lent his aid to the Tories. I rather 
 think my father's sense of humour must, even at the 
 time, have been pleasantly tickled by the events that 
 took place. He had no sympathies with the Tories, 
 though he had let his ca~s to them ; and then having 
 vainly tried to carry out his contract for he did start 
 the cars that afterwards got smashed he went over to
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 217 
 
 the opposite side, to the side on which all his wishes 
 were engaged, feeling tolerably sure also that he would 
 get a compensation for the destruction of his property. 
 
 It was delightful to me to hear my father speak of 
 those palmy days when Dan O'Connell and Sheil, and 
 many other now half-forgotten celebrities, were guests 
 at his house. He would speak of the Liberator and 
 Sheil together, and make comparisons between the two 
 men. He loved to speak of O'Connell, and to recall 
 the many traits of real kindliness of heart that he 
 unconsciously showed. 
 
 Once in the middle of a contested election, when the 
 Liberator was staying at my father's house, and there 
 was a long day's work in hand, he was late for break- 
 fast, and my father rushed up into his bedroom to hasten 
 him down-stairs. He found the big man standing in 
 the middle of the room with a razor in his hand, 
 his face half smeared over with soap, listening to my 
 pretty little sister tell him of her joy at getting a new 
 doll, and of her perplexity that "Dolly wouldn't 
 drink." And after the day's work was done, no one 
 was so charming in company as Dan O'Connell. His 
 conversation was so amusing, and his manner to women 
 and to children was so pleasing, that he exercised a 
 sort of fascination over people wherever he went. His 
 nature was like that of a fine diamond throwing out its 
 fire and light on every side. His mind was very quick 
 to catch the impressions of the moment, he had some 
 feeling in common with every class and grade of Irish- 
 men. He was very susceptible to sudden emotions, con-
 
 218 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 sequently he was impulsive, and his adversaries spoke 
 of him as a humbug, or a play-actor. It was simply 
 that they who did not know him failed to see the man's 
 many-sided nature, and how a dozen thoughts, all in 
 different directions, would be working in his mind at 
 the same time. 
 
 The following story will, I think, tell in the 
 Liberator's favour in the eyes of all fair-minded 
 people. One Sunday morning he and my father both 
 communicated at early mass in the Clonmel Friary, 
 and my father noticed that at the altar O'Connell wore 
 a white glove on his right hand. Now, my father was 
 a curious and rather inquisitive man, and he rarely 
 failed to gratify his curiosity. He had a demure, 
 matter-of-fact way of asking questions that invariably 
 elicited a reply without betraying indiscretion on his 
 part or giving offence. So, after service, he blurted 
 out in his usual manner, " Liberator, what makes you 
 wear a white glove at communion ? " O'Connell 
 turned round and looked at my father ; he raised his 
 hat slightly and said, in a tone of voice that my father 
 never forgot, " That hand once took a fellow-creature's 
 life ; I never bare it in the presence of my Redeemer/' 
 My father has told me that he then wished that the 
 earth had opened her mouth and swallowed him up, 
 or that O'Connell would have scolded him severely for 
 asking such an impertinent question anything rather 
 than his calm and simple allusion to the duel in which 
 he had killed a fellow-creature. 
 
 That Dan O'Connell could rate a man soundly and
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 219 
 
 give him a piece of his mind in very plain language is 
 so well known, that I need hardly do more than make 
 allusion to it here. My father used to tell a story that 
 at a meeting Dan had fallen foul of the press, and had 
 styled certain Orange reporters who had used every 
 petty means to clip and twist his speeches by the name 
 of mice. One of them instantly jumped up and said, 
 " Do you dare, sir, to call me a mouse?" "No, sir," 
 replied Dan, " I don't call you a mouse ; I call you 
 a great big rat." 
 
 My father wished two more facts to be recorded of 
 his dealings with the Liberator. Though he had him- 
 self joined the Repeal movement vigorously, his sym- 
 pathies were not with it ; he preferred Imperial to Home 
 Rule. Some one once taunted him with this, and he 
 coolly replied, " Any man would have followed Dan 
 when he was in the right ; it is my boast to have fol- 
 lowed him right and wrong." My father justified this 
 course by alleging that the Repeal Agitation got many 
 good things for Ireland, especially judgeships. A due 
 proportion of Liberal Catholic judges was one of his 
 ideals. When he went to take leave of the dying 
 Liberator he followed him to mass. Dan's last words 
 were, when they parted at the church door, " I should 
 die happy if I saw an impartial Bench and pure admi- 
 nistration of justice." 
 
 My father had plenty of stories, too, of Sheil, whose 
 genius he much respected, but whose fine and some- 
 times caustic wit he did not admire as he loved the 
 Liberator's genial fun and pleasant humour. SheiPs
 
 220 CHARLES EIANCONI. 
 
 angular gestures, the shrill tones of his voice, his 
 sparkling eyes, and the deep pathos that he would 
 throw into the defence of a condemned prisoner, inte- 
 rested my father very much. It happened once that 
 Sheil was lodging just opposite to my father in the 
 same street, and a poor old woman came to my father 
 in his room, and begged him to ask Sheil's landlady to 
 have an eye to the poor crazy gentleman over the way. 
 My father rushed to the window, thinking to see a 
 man in a fit of madness, but instead he discovered 
 Sheil standing before a great looking-glass, rehearsing 
 to himself the speech for the defence of a criminal that 
 he was about to make on the following day. 
 
 I have not concealed that my father was, to a certain 
 extent, fond of popularity, and that he was not without 
 vanity, which he did not endeavour to hide as a Briton 
 would perhaps more artistically have done. I have no 
 doubt that he was prejudiced against the Ascendancy 
 party, but I have also no doubt that the state of things 
 into which the Italian boy dropped, as though out of 
 the sky, was specially calculated to engender and foster 
 his natural inclinations. I have lately been looking over 
 old law reports, over O'Connell's and Sheil's speeches 
 at agrarian trials, and I find on comparing these with 
 my father's stories, that what I was once half inclined to 
 ascribe to intolerance on his part is fully borne out by 
 facts. In political matters my father thought strongly 
 and he spoke strongly, but the plain and matter-of-fact 
 way that he looked at things in the face enabled him 
 generally to see the right and wrong of a case without
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 221 
 
 suffering his judgment to be warped by sentimental or 
 party feeling. 
 
 "When the bulk of the administration of the lands of 
 Munster was in the hands of venal agents and grinding 
 middlemen, when Drummond's famous dictum, " Pro- 
 perty has its duties as well as its rights/' was received 
 with a storm of landlord indignation, it seems only too 
 natural that there should have been a system of or- 
 ganized resistance on the part of the poor peasantry. 
 Then came the Tithe system, the worst and the hardest 
 to bear of all the grievances under which the Catholics 
 then laboured. This fell with peculiar severity upon 
 the poor man, for he was compelled to pay from his 
 small substance towards the support of a Church that 
 was not his, and towards men whose object was to keep 
 him in a state of servitude. 
 
 In my father's mind the house of Beresford was the 
 most perfect type of the Ascendancy party. They were 
 undoubtedly a clever race, and tradition loves to dwell 
 on their great size and manly beauty, their lordly 
 manners and the love of sport which has run through 
 their family. The Beresford who broke his neck in 
 the hunting-field is still affectionately spoken of as 
 " The Marquis," though there have been two marquises 
 since his day. They were mostly personally popular, 
 generally good landlords, and given to spending their 
 time and money in manly sports among the people. 
 Even the Liberator freely admitted that he had been 
 . their advocate in ordinary lawsuits, and had every 
 reason to think well personally of his clients. But this
 
 222 CHARLES BLLNCONI. 
 
 masterful race so personified Ascendancy, that when 
 their power was broken by the election in 1826, when 
 Villiers Stuart got in for TVaterford in opposition to 
 one of their house, it was a matter of public rejoicing. 
 
 So far as I can gather, my father was perpetually at 
 work on behalf of one or more Liberal candidates. He 
 never himself sought for parliamentary honours ; I do 
 not think that he ever felt that longing to pass beyond 
 the big policeman into the sacred precincts of St. 
 Stephen's, that his friend Mr. Anthony Trollope has so 
 graphically described. But even to the last he would 
 bristle up at the sound of a contest. He has gone to the 
 poll and recorded his vote with the weight of eighty sum- 
 mers upon him, and a broken leg into the bargain ay, 
 and been fresh and lively after it, too. Perhaps there 
 was nothing that interested him more than a general 
 election, he was always busy on behalf of some Liberal 
 candidate; the leaders of the party were always his 
 friends, and frequently guests at his house ; and I have 
 a notion that half of their campaigns were planned 
 and partially worked out in his dining-room. By 
 degrees as his cars spread, the man of thirty votes 
 became an important political power ; and I break no 
 trust in saying that, before a general election, my 
 father invariably informed himself who were the can- 
 didates most agreeable to the Liberal Government. Of 
 the Liberal Government, he was an avowed partisan ; 
 he considered their administration to be all that was 
 right and good for our country, and in Lord Car- 
 lisle's lifetime, when a general election was at hand,
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 223 
 
 he always went to him to offer his vote where it was 
 most needed. Of the many Government men for whom 
 he voted some he liked and others he disliked. There 
 were two, however, for whom he entertained a peculiar 
 regard, whom he used specially to designate as being 
 pure men, and in his mind political purity was a rare 
 virtue. These two men were the late Chief Baron 
 Pigot, and the present Lord O'Hagan. 
 
 I will now give a few letters touching upon the 
 .events of the time, and it will be better perhaps to let 
 them speak for themselves. In some of these there are 
 little traits that go beyond the region of politics, and 
 show the character of the writers. I will not attempt 
 to put them chronologically, but those of the Liberator's 
 I keep together and place them first. 
 
 This letter I found among my father's papers ; it 
 was evidently sent on to him by Mr. Maher, who was 
 for a long time M.P. for Tipperary : 
 
 " DERRYNANE ABBEY, ISt/i Sept., 1829. 
 
 " MY DEAR MAHER, I got your letter so late that 
 I fear my reply will not reach you before the dinner to 
 Mr. Otway Cave has been actually given. I regret 
 extremely that the shortness of the notice prevents me 
 from being able to pay him that compliment which I 
 am quite certain he merits. I think I know him well, 
 and I am convinced the House of Commons does not con- 
 tain a man of more pure, honourable, and patriotic mind. 
 He is one of the most unaffectedly honest public men in 
 the British dominions ; and I trust I shall live to see him,
 
 224 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 and that shortly, fill the station of representative of your 
 county [Tipperary] a county which has been so long 
 misrepresented by scions of a very worthless aristocracy. 
 Indeed, my indignation against the great men of your 
 county is at this moment at its height, because I learn 
 from the newspapers that they are so totally regardless of 
 constitutional feeling and common humanity as to seek 
 to have the infamous measure of the Insurrection Act in- 
 troduced. But their vile speculation will, I trust, be dis- 
 appointed by the firmness of the Government, and ther 
 better sense of Parliament. The people, too, should be 
 thoroughly aware that the way to defeat their enemies is 
 to observe the law, to avoid all riots and outrages, and 
 not strengthen the hands of their enemies by committing 
 crimes. Crimes must and will be punished. The crimes 
 against the people are for the present less likely to meet 
 punishment. But the scenes that are gone by will 
 never be repeated, and the people will themselves learn 
 that the way to triumph over their malignant enemies 
 is to abstain from secret societies, illegal oaths, and 
 Whiteboy outrages. If Mr. Otway Cave were the re- 
 presentative of your county he would cause the magis- 
 tracy to be purged, or he would at least expose the delin- 
 quencies which the improper part of them may commit. 
 
 " Express, I beg of you, to Mr. Otway Cave my very 
 sincere regret that I cannot be at this dinner, and tell 
 him that nobody can more desire to show him every mark 
 of respect and esteem than I do. Very faithfully yours, 
 
 " DANIEL O'CoxNELL. 
 
 " To Nicholas Maher, Esq., Thurles."
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 225 
 
 [Most private, most confidential.] 
 
 " LIMERICK, 6th May, 1831. 
 
 " MY DEAR BIANCONI, You will hear with indig- 
 nation as well as surprise that Lord Kemnare has 
 turned against me in Kerry, having given up Water- 
 ford, and being now doubtful in Kerry. Many friends 
 of mine have turned their longing eyes to Tipperary. 
 I write to you for an answer to these two questions. 
 " 1st. Could you get for me a requisition to stand 
 
 respectably signed ? 
 
 " 2nd. Could you return me beyond any doubt ? 
 " Write to me here, and do not show this letter to 
 anybody, unless in the strictest confidence. 
 
 " Believe me always yours, very sincerely, 
 
 (t DANIEL O'CONNELL. 
 
 " Charles Bianconi, Esq.'' 
 
 " MERRION SQUARE, 24th March, 1843. 
 
 " MY DEAR FRIEND, What the deuce is Tipperary 
 doing? What the double deuce is Clonmel doing? 
 And especially what is its valiant Corporation doing ? 
 Sligo, Drogheda, Limerick, Cork, Waterford, Dublin 
 all the Liberal Corporations except Clonmel have 
 either given proofs of Irish patriotism, or else have 
 shown themselves alive to it. What is Charles 
 Bianconi doing? A vivacious animal in himself, but 
 now seemingly as torpid as a flea in a wet blanket. 
 So much for scolding you all. And now, my good 
 friend, is it not a crying shame that your noble county 
 
 Q
 
 226 CHARLES BIA.NCONI. 
 
 should remain in such, apathy and torpor when all the 
 rest of Ireland is rousing itself into a combined effort 
 for the Repeal. I want a Repeal meeting either at 
 Clonmel, or Cashel, or Thurles. I want to see from 
 60,000 to 100,000 Tipperary men meeting peacefully, 
 and returning home quietly, to adopt the Petition, and 
 to organise the Repeal Rent. Now you know you 
 must get into motion, there's no use at all in hanging 
 back any longer when you set about it. I know you 
 will do the thing right well. I am to be at Rathkeale 
 on Tuesday, the 18th of April, and I could be at either 
 of the three towns I have mentioned upon Thursday, 
 the 20th April ; so now put these things together and 
 set about working. Do nothing without the co-opera- 
 tion of the clergy. I need give you no further advice 
 or instructions. Though you are a foreigner you have 
 brains in your noddle, and are able to perceive, even 
 amidst the levity of my phrases, the intensity of my 
 anxiety to bring forward Tipperary speedily and 
 energetically, but peaceably. What will you do for 
 the cause ? You should answer me that. With 
 sincerest regards to your family, believe me always, 
 " Yours most faithfully, 
 
 "DANIEL O'CONNELL. 
 
 " Charles Bianconi, Esq." 
 
 [Confidential.] 
 
 " DUBLIN : MERRION SQUARE, 1st September, 1846. 
 "My DEAR FRIEND, Are you humbugging about 
 standing for Clonmel ? You are quite aware that you
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 227 
 
 are not eligible, and that you could not continue to sit. 
 You are also aware that there is no man living I would 
 be more anxious to serve and oblige than yourself; 
 and if you were capable of sitting for Clonmel, it would 
 delight me to have you returned, but, I repeat, my 
 opinion in point of law is that you may be turned out 
 of the seat without the expense of a petition, but on a 
 mere motion, and at any time after you have once 
 taken the seat. I have a notion, too, that you would 
 be liable to a penalty of 500 for each day you sat in 
 the House. I do not say this positively, because I 
 have not had time fully to investigate the law. 
 
 " If you are serious as to standing for Clonmel, con- 
 sult some eminent counsel before you do anything. 
 "What I am afraid of is that we should be laughed at if 
 you were returned. 
 
 " I venture, therefore, to entreat of you to give up 
 the idea, if you seriously entertain it. But at all 
 events, and in every event, believe me to be your 
 attached friend, 
 
 "DANIEL O'CONNELL. 
 
 " Charles Bianconi, Esq., Mayor of ClonmeL" 
 
 " THE COLLEGE, THURLES, 4th June, 1847. 
 
 " MY DEAR FRIEND, I have an idea of the loss we 
 have sustained in the death of our beloved Liberator. It 
 is irreparable. I trust in God his great spirit will con- 
 tinue to guide us. "We must, however, be men, we 
 must be united ; every honest man in the kingdom
 
 228 CHARLES BIANCOXI. 
 
 must now act an honest part. Unless we stand together 
 the county is inevitably thrown back half a century. 
 The Orange party are now quite sure of regaining their 
 former ascendancy. They are in this county making 
 active preparations already to recover their lost ground. 
 We had a meeting here to-day to confer about testify- 
 ing publicly our sorrow for our beloved Liberator. Men- 
 tion was made of the Attorney- General intending to 
 stand for the county, when all to a man at once scouted 
 the idea indignantly, especially the priests. This be- 
 tween ourselves. Now what is to be done ? Whatever is 
 to be done should be done quickly. The enemy is already 
 preparing to take the field. There should be county 
 meetings at as early a day as possible. Not a day, not 
 an hour to be lost. I'll tell you what would be the best 
 of all : you yourself standing. Run over and get the 
 necessary Act passed with as little delay as you can. 
 The Government will be anxious to do it, that the 
 county may not pass into the hands of the Tories. I 
 know the feelings of the priests, and I am positive, as I 
 am of my own existence, that they would not merely 
 support you, but support you with all their hearts, and 
 carry you through triumphantly. 
 
 " Believe me, my dear Mr. Bianconi, yours truly, 
 
 " PATRICK LEAHY. i " 
 
 " Tltursday. 
 
 " DEAR SIR, You ought to know that ' old birds, 
 like horses, are not to be caught with chaff.'
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 229 
 
 " You showed me yesterday an ancient constituency 
 return that was four years old. It was not quite con- 
 venient, I guess, to show the state of the votes for 1845. 
 I can, with more candour, give you the present state of 
 affairs. Our last reports state there are not, bonaf.de, 
 1,300 men who could vote on the .1st February, 1845, 
 deducting, of course, changes of farms, deaths, &c. 
 Now if a few Catholic tenants stay away, or vote with 
 their landlords, I should imagine we should have some 
 sort of chance. 
 
 " I remain, dear sir, yours, not quite in the dark, 
 
 " GLENGALL. 
 
 " C. Bianconi, Esq." 
 
 " REFORM CLUB, DAWSON STREET, 
 " ZQth August, 1846. 
 
 "My DEAR BIANCONI, In a few days now, I dare 
 eay, the new Chief Baron will be glad to get his 
 appointment, which will cause an election in your 
 town. The fate of our county and borough will be 
 greatly influenced by your acts. This is the time for 
 men to show not only their common sense, but their 
 love of old Ireland, and also of justice. I really never 
 before entertained such strong hopes as at present; 
 such a Government Ireland never had before. If your 
 town acts under your advice, and I sincerely hope and 
 believe it will, as one of your old road-companions, I 
 will say in the language of my own trade, give Lord 
 John a good wheeler, and, believe me, the coach will
 
 230 CHARLES BIA^CONI. 
 
 work steady. The only law-prop they had will be 
 removed to the bench ere long ; supply his place 
 with another, and continue the honour to Cloninel of 
 always assisting the Liberal Government. The idea of 
 a split now amongst the Liberals is too monstrous to 
 entertain. For my own part I will not give it a 
 thought. I feel certain, however, that there may be 
 some mad rogues everywhere, but our friends in 
 Clonmel will act as thinking, steady men when headed 
 by such men as yourself and your admirable clergy. I 
 have every hope, you will ask why I am so solicitous, 
 but on consideration you will not do so. I will simply 
 reply, because I love my country, I love my religion, I 
 wish to see the people well governed and happy, and I 
 believe the present Government have these objects at 
 heart. I threw up J.P. and D.L., and would have 
 done the same if I had situations of emolument, sooner 
 than serve under such an Irish Government as the last. 
 But I am proud of being restored to my former rank, 
 which they have done in the handsomest manner, by 
 classing me with such men as the Liberator and Lord 
 French. Were the vacancy to have been in county 
 "Wexford, or its borough, I would have expected a 
 similar hint from you. So excuse my entreating you 
 to assist by every means in your power such a Govern- 
 ment as we are now blessed with. 
 
 " Ever, my dear friend, yours most sincerely, 
 
 "Jems H. TALBOT,"
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 231 
 
 The following is an extract of a letter written by 
 ni} T father to his secretary, Mr. O'Leary : 
 
 " Many thanks for all the interesting news you give 
 me, particularly about the elections ; but I fear our pre- 
 sent material to fight the great Cromwellian county of 
 Tipperary is as hopeless as could be expected. How- 
 ever, I hope the virtues of our people and their re- 
 constitution, as a unanimous principle of moral and 
 political activity, will get us our rights. 
 
 " What a pity that the few good men we have 
 amongst us cannot be put in motion. Your account of 
 Mr. Lawless and Clonmel was most cheering. He is, 
 with all his faults, a first-class M.P. I greatly regret 
 the demoralisation at Cashel, but good will come from 
 
 it. I fear will be returned for Limerick. What 
 
 a shame ! I regret the two last men for that city. 
 I hope we are safe in county Dublin, and that my 
 friend Reynolds was returned by a great majority for 
 the City of Dublin. I should like very much to see 
 Green returned for Dungarvan. What a pity that 
 Connemara has not had a separate and local sale. I 
 fear our poor people there are going from the frying- 
 pan into the fire. Who bought New Park ? And tell 
 me all about the late sales. Be sure Lisheen is not 
 sold unknown to us. What a pity I had no one to 
 assist me in getting Price's place instead of Grubb. 
 To get it such a bargain under my nose ! How is 
 Father Kirwan, and 'how are all our reverend friends ?
 
 232 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 I hope he will take a run to us and give himself 
 some recreation. Tell him this world will be after him. 
 
 " Yours truly, 
 
 " C. BlANCOSI. 
 
 " D. F. O'Leary, Esq." 
 
 " DUBLIN CASTLB, March 31, 1857. 
 
 " MY DEAR SIR, I received your letters late yester- 
 day evening, for which many thanks. I have seen the 
 Attorney-General on the subject, and find he has 
 written to you to Athlone, requesting you to go to 
 Galway to vote for Blake and Dunkillen, and to-morrow 
 to Cashel for Sir J. O'Brien. Thursday, as you 
 intended ; I trust you may be able to do so. 
 
 " Yours very faithfully, 
 
 " FRED. HOWARD. 
 
 " C. Bianconi, Esq." 
 
 The first election that I remember taking any 
 interest in was for the county Tipperary in 1857. 
 There was then what my father called an unnatural 
 contest between two Liberals, The O'Donoghue and Mr. 
 "Waldron. The following letter from the Archbishop 
 of Cashel to my father will show how the matter 
 stood : 
 
 " THVRLKS, $th March, 1857. 
 
 "My DEAR SIR, This unnatural contest is most 
 afflicting. Is there no possibility of inducing The 
 O'Donoghue to retire ? If he did retire, he and Mr.
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 233 
 
 Waldron would be returned without a contest at 
 the general election. There can be no doubt that the 
 present supporters of The O'Donoghue would be his 
 supporters then too ; and there would, I think, be no 
 disposition to oppose him. He can retire with a 
 certain prospect of being returned at the general 
 election. It is not so with Mr. Waldron. His 
 retiring now would not ensure his return at the 
 general election, for the Club are, I understand, 
 pledged to Major Massey, and it is to be presumed that 
 the supporters in general of The O'Donoghue will go 
 with tire Club. If The O'Donoghue retires now, he is 
 sure to be returned at the general election. If Mr. 
 Waldron retires now he is not sure of being returned 
 then. This ought to induce the former to retire. 
 " I remain, my dear sir, yours very sincerely, 
 
 " P. LEAHY. * 
 
 " C. Bianconi, Esq., 
 &c. &c. &c." 
 
 As a general election was near at hand my father 
 staunchly supported Mr. Waldron, and did all he 
 could to dissuade The O'Donoghue from coming for- 
 ward to contest the single seat, as his return would 
 be morally certain a few months later. He took, then, 
 a rather singular step, and one that would have been 
 considered very impertinent had anybody else so in- 
 terfered, but as he was well known to have peculiar 
 ways of his own of doing things, it passed off without 
 any special remark. He went to Cork to a wise and
 
 234 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 old friend of his, whom he knew to have business 
 relations with the young candidate, and whom he sus- 
 pected of being his purse-bearer, in the fond hope of 
 stopping the supplies, and thus averting a split in the 
 Liberal camp, and also of saving the Liberator's kins- 
 man the large sums of money that were sure to be 
 spent in the contest. But all to no purpose. My 
 father returned only to tell the story against himself, 
 and to see the lavish expenditure he had endeavoured 
 to save. The end of it all was that The O'Donoghue 
 got his seat ; and at the general election he was again 
 returned together with Mr. TValdron. 
 
 My father always continued to vote for Mr. Waldron 
 until that excellent gentleman crossed what seemed to 
 my father the bounds between Whiggism and common 
 sense. " What the d 1 is he at," my father would 
 emphatically exclaim, till at last he found that he 
 could vote for Mr. "Waldron no longer. The two men, 
 however, kept up their good feeling for each other in 
 spite of their political differences. 
 
 In February, 1865, The O'Donoghue retired from 
 county Tipperary, and transferred his services to Tralee. 
 Many in our county were indignant, but my father 
 thought it was natural and prudent for him to sit for a 
 borough in his own county, where the expenses of 
 renewed contests would probably be not so great. 
 
 I do not wish to be considered responsible for all 
 my father's prejudices, but there was one which I fear 
 was only too well founded ; and few people will deny 
 that the same sort of thing has not happened else-
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 235 
 
 where. He always maintained that when the Tory 
 landlords saw that they would fail to get one of their 
 own party into Parliament, they encouraged their 
 tenants to vote for the Fenian nominee, in the hope 
 of baulking the steady-going Liberal, who could, as 
 my father loved to express it, " afford to be honest." 
 And I have known a great Protestant landowner boast 
 of having given tacit support to the ultra-Liberal can- 
 didate in the pious hope that he would thereby cause 
 mischief in the Liberal benches. 
 
 Just before the general election of 1865 my father 
 broke his^thigh, from which he never completely re- 
 covered, though even in his crippled state he managed 
 to get about marvellously. After his accident he was 
 Lid up for six months, quite incapable of stirring, and 
 this inactivity worried him beyond measure. Two 
 days before his mishap he had attended a county meet- 
 ing in Thurles, and my mother has told me that he never 
 was better or more lively than he was then. Then, 
 in his seventy-eighth year, he came down the steps and 
 jumped up on the car as though he had been a young man. 
 And later, when the fracture was partially mended, he 
 would have himself driven to the polling booth, then 
 be helped on to his crutches, and so go and record his 
 vote amid the stones, the mud, the dead cats, and other 
 missiles not uncommon at elections in Tipperary. 
 
 At length the general election of 1868 came on, and 
 my father had then got used to his infirmity. He was 
 moved about in various ways ; on the level ground he 
 walked a little with the help of his crutches, but he had
 
 236 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 to be lifted into his carriage, and at railway stations lie 
 was frequently wheeled along sitting upon his port- 
 manteau on the luggage truck. His butler, James 
 Sweetman, whose care I think prolonged his life, 
 always accompanied him, and showed great ingenuity 
 in getting him about ; and Sweetman was probably 
 inclined to doubt my father when he said that he was 
 "as fresh as ever he was." He certainly was "very 
 fit" at that time, if I may be allowed the slang phrase. 
 His interest about the elections was intensely keen, and 
 I never lived in such an atmosphere of politics as I 
 did then. "What he could not do himself he deputed 
 to my husband, and he assuredly was not slow in 
 responding to the call. It used to amuse me beyond 
 measure to see Morgan John O'Connell, who had let 
 his brilliant prospects slip away from him through a 
 sort of indolent carelessness, work at the elections as 
 three other men would have done. Thoroughly as he 
 enjoyed the pleasures of canvassing, my husband was 
 in truth guided and kept in bounds by strong consci- 
 entious feelings, and it would be well if all men were 
 actuated by the same plain notions of political honesty 
 as he always showed. He went to Cork and to Clare, 
 he ran down to Kerry, his old county, to rally round 
 his nephew, The O'Donoghue, at Tralee, where his 
 election was threatened. My husband had no vote 
 there, but the people liked to see their old county 
 member; and 'if there was one thing on which he 
 prided himself it was his electioneering for other people. 
 In the autumn of 1869 my father indulged in a fit
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 237 
 
 of manoeuvring which was incomprehensible to me, and 
 I believe, if he were alive now to speak the truth, he 
 would say incomprehensible to himself also. Whether he 
 was actuated by his natural love for a bit of scheming, 
 or by a fit of economy, I cannot say ; any way, his 
 plans failed, and I should add, deservedly failed, for 
 they were about the worst that any sane man ever 
 adopted. There was at this time, consequent upon 
 Mr. Moore's death, a vacancy for the county of Tip- 
 perary. No Catholic squire was disposed to put himself 
 forward, the Fenians and the Tories were pretty 
 busy each on their side, and were prepared to coalesce 
 up to a certain point, and there was no man of our 
 party round whom the people would rally and to whom 
 they would give their support. Some of the Catholic 
 gentry, and the elder and more staid men among the 
 clergy, wished that my husband would offer him- 
 self as the parliamentary candidate. Had he done so 
 and come forward at once, I think he would have 
 been a very desirable man. The magic name of 
 O'Connell, his political antecedents, his personal popu- 
 larity, and his rich and influential father-in-law, were 
 all good qualifications in his favour. He had repre- 
 sented Kerry for seventeen years, and when the " bad 
 times" had compelled him to retire, he carried with 
 him the goodwill of all parties. For a man who was 
 neither rich nor great, " Morgan John," as he was 
 everywhere called, was about the most popular man of 
 his time. 
 
 Now, my father had not been at first much dis-
 
 238 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 posed to help my husband to a seat in the House of 
 Commons, but after four years' close intimacy, when 
 he had seen that his son-in-law was not disposed to 
 repeat the extravagancies of his youth, he became 
 anxious that he should re-enter public life. At this 
 time my father had made his will, but neither I nor 
 my husband had any notion of what he intended to do 
 with his property. Between my father and myself the 
 warmest friendship and the closest confidence had long 
 existed. I constantly acted as his secretary in im- 
 portant private matters, but to no living soul per- 
 haps to me less than to anybody else would he ever 
 reveal a word of how he intended to leave his pro- 
 perty after his death. Our friends and the people about 
 us of course knew nothing about our family matters ; 
 and I suspect that some imagined that my husband 
 would have my father's money after his death. 
 
 I really think that my husband would have been 
 returned at the cost of a few hundred pounds for legi- 
 timate expenses but for a little extra caution on his 
 part, and but for a certain tacit suspicion of something 
 with which " the wily Italian " never failed to inspire 
 his friends the clergy. After Dr. Leahy, the Archbishop 
 of Cashel, my father and my husband were all dead, I 
 accidentally heard that His Grace had said to a popular 
 priest who was known to wish for my husband's candi- 
 dature, " Take care of old Bian ! don't stir unless he 
 lodges 4,000 in a National Bank." Now this was 
 just what my father would not do. He offered to open 
 a credit, to advance the money at five per cent., to do
 
 ELECTIONEERING. 239 
 
 anything but risk it; but my husband was too cautious. 
 He i'elt how a burnt child dreads the fire, and he plainly 
 refused to put himself forward as a candidate upon his 
 own responsibility. I am far from saying that my dear 
 father was wrong in refusing to advance any money to 
 my husband to enable him to get into Parliament, but 
 I think he was very injudicious in wishing that my 
 husband should come forward, and yet not say whether 
 or not he would assist him pecuniarily if he made the 
 attempt. My father began to scold me roundly, saying 
 that I had prevented my husband from a public life. 
 I could not altogether deny this. I replied that I had 
 told my husband that I could not advocate such a step, 
 though I would not for a moment oppose him if he 
 thought it right. What were my father's motives all 
 this time, what was working in his mind, I am at a 
 loss to conceive, unless it be, as I have said, his innate 
 love of dodging, joined to a desire not to spend his 
 money upon an object of which he did not see the 
 practical utility. Could he have rendered to my hus- 
 band a service adequate to the money to be expended, 
 he would, I believe, not have hesitated ; but he did not 
 like to risk his money on the chance that his son-in- 
 law might gain a temporary distinction that was more 
 honourable than lucrative. 
 
 Had my father been as plain and frank in the matter 
 towards my husband as my husband had been towards 
 him, much trouble would have been saved. As it 
 was, my husband's candidature dwindled away, and he 
 found himself at last canvassing for Mr. Caulfield
 
 240 CHAELES BIAXCONI. 
 
 Heron, who polled a smaller number of votes than the 
 Fenian candidate, O'Donovan Rossa. 
 
 My father's election correspondence would of itself 
 form a small curiosity shop. There are letters from 
 viceroys and from car-agents, from archbishops and 
 from poor curates, from Daniel O'Connell and from 
 William Smith O'Brien. There are letters from lord 
 chancellors of Ireland, from judges who had sat for 
 some years on the Liberal benches in the House of 
 Commons, from lord -lieu tenants of counties, from 
 patriotic editors, and from recalcitrant tenants, all of 
 which would throw some light on the political history 
 of Ireland during the last forty years. Some of these 
 letters are interesting, and some of them are now very 
 amusing. They form a record of honest ambition duly 
 gratified, of disappointed hopes, broken vows, empty 
 threats, bribes, donations, and false compliments. Hap- 
 pily for one's faith in man, there are also letters from 
 a few politicians, such as Lord O'Hagan and the late 
 Chief Baron Pigot, men who never forgot their re- 
 ligion, their honour, nor their country. 
 
 In all these letters my father's sagacity and his in- 
 domitable pluck come out very strongly. The old man 
 faced the temporal threats of tenants and the spiritual 
 thunders of patriotic parish priests, and after a time, 
 when the heated passions had become cool, he and his 
 adversaries again became excellent friends. Interesting 
 as this correspondence is, I have neither the wish nor 
 the ability to write a history ; I cannot do more than 
 mention it at the close of this electioneering chapter.
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 LONGF1ELD. 
 
 LONGFIELD is a pretty, small property in county Tip- 
 perary of six hundred Irish, or a thousand English, 
 acres, and situated within a mile and a half from 
 Goold's Cross Station, from whence you may reach 
 Dublin by the train in rather less than five hours. It 
 is the last estate in the parish of Boherlahan, and in 
 the south riding of the county. The large cheerful 
 house is beautifully situated, overlooking the river 
 Suir, and the well-wooded pleasure-grounds slope gra- 
 dually down towards the banks of the river. From 
 our windows the Galtee Mountains and the far-famed 
 Rock of Cashel may be seen ; and from the top of the 
 Hill of Ring, within five miles of Longfield, you get 
 a fine view of a flat and well -cultivated country, 
 stretching for twenty miles to the foot of Slieve-na- 
 more ; the Galtee Mountains, and Knockmealdown 
 being farther in the distance. 
 
 This was my father's first and principal acquisition 
 R
 
 242 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 of property, and indeed his home ever since 1846. He 
 bought it from Captain Long by private contract 
 shortly before the days of the Encumbered Estates 
 Court. Captain Long told my father that, though he 
 differed very much from him in religion, he sold his 
 property to him because he knew he would be a just 
 and generous master to his tenants. The purchase was 
 made in March, but we did not come to live here 
 until the 16th of September following. 
 
 This was my sixth birthday, and I have still a lively 
 recollection of the crowd of people, the popular enthu- 
 siasm, and the hearty reception that was given to my 
 father, all the more pleasant, perhaps, as he was totally 
 ignorant of it till he found the people ready to greet 
 him and bid him welcome. Large bonfires were made 
 on the roads near the house, a triumphal arch was 
 erected over the avenue gate, and the grounds were 
 thronged with the tenants and the labourers, and with 
 their wives, their sons, and their daughters. An 
 amateur band from Cashel, dressed in their uniform, 
 had come out to greet my father ; and the band of 
 course made an occasion for a little dancing. The lads 
 and lassies were 
 
 ' Tripping on the light fantastic toe, 
 "Whilst the merry pipes kept tune 
 With violin and tabor." 
 
 It was a pleasant and joyous scene, showing some of 
 the good traits in the Irish character. After the dance 
 there was an interval of some twenty minutes, and then
 
 LONGFIELD. 243 
 
 a deputation from the tenantry came forward and pre- 
 sented an address to my father. I take these details 
 from an account of the proceedings written for a local 
 newspaper by Mr. Thomas Dorney, my father's clerk 
 during the two years that he was Mayor of Clonmel. 
 Mr. Dorney describes the address as being "an 
 eloquent composition." I have not the slightest doubt 
 of this fact, but perhaps my readers will excuse me for 
 not giving them any further proof. I will, however, with 
 their leave, give my father's reply, as it shows how he 
 was actuated towards his tenants, and it shows also some 
 of his strong common sense ; though it was by no 
 means an " eloquent composition," such as the deputa- 
 tion had presented to him, but rather a collection of 
 Poor Richard's wise-saws. He said : " Friends and 
 neighbours, I thank you for the honour you have done 
 me, and I accept your address with great pleasure. It 
 affords me much satisfaction to meet my tenants and 
 neighbours, who latterly have become proverbial for 
 morality, good conduct, and temperance (cheers). I am 
 delighted to be so intimately connected with so deserving 
 a class. I have always recognised the ever-memorable 
 saying of my lamented friend, Mr. Drummond : ' Pro- 
 perty has its duties as well as its rights.' We should all, 
 according to our state in society, have our rights 
 (cheers). The landlord should have his, the mechanic 
 and the labourer should also have theirs (cheers). I 
 think the poor man who earns by his labour a shilling 
 a day has as good a right to enjoyment and to his cabin 
 as the Queen has to her throne (cheers). The citizen.
 
 244 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 and the farmer also, have their peculiar rights, and it 
 shall ever be my duty to see those rights vindicated 
 (cheers). These men also have their duties. The labourer 
 cannot expect to be paid unless he works in return. 
 If the landlord does his duty to you, he will expect of 
 you to do the same to him. You must understand 
 your duties as well as your rights. I am determined 
 to do everything a man ought to do to those whom 
 Providence has placed under me. The rich and the 
 poor are God's creatures (cheers), and, as a land- 
 lord, my duty is to see that my tenants shall have 
 proper time and facilities to cultivate their land ; and I, 
 in return for giving them the land for its value, expect 
 to be properly paid. I have no idea that one man more 
 than another should not be bound to discharge the 
 respective duties which he owes to the great human 
 family; therefore I feel great pleasure in receiving 
 your address. It gives me too much pleasure to find 
 that I have to do with a peaceful, moral, and indus- 
 trious class of men, and I regret that I was not aware 
 of your kindness in time to have refreshments prepared 
 for you, particularly after the delightful scene which I 
 have had the pleasure of witnessing. The merry dance, 
 continued with such truly Irish spirit by the young 
 men and really handsome girls among whom I am 
 surrounded (cheers), was a sight that did me good, for 
 I love to see young people enjoy themselves in a whole- 
 some and honest manner. It is my wish that when you 
 want anything which is in my power to grant you, that 
 you should not be thinking about it. Whenever you
 
 LONGFIELD. 245 
 
 want any improvement to be made, either in your land 
 or farming implements, ask me ; it will always afford 
 me much pleasure to assist you by every means in my 
 power in everything that can tend to ameliorate your 
 condition (cheers). Before I conclude these hasty obser- 
 vations, allow me to impress upon you the great import- 
 ance of respecting the laws. The laws are made for the 
 good and benefit of society and for the punishment of 
 the wicked. You cannot offend the laws with impunity. 
 No one but an enemy would counsel you to outrage the 
 laws. Look around you, and will you not see the face of 
 society improved ? Much of that improvement is owing 
 to the temperate habits of the people, to the mission of 
 my respected friend, Father Mathew (loud cheers), and 
 to the advice of the Liberator (cheers). Above all 
 things avoid secret and unlawful societies. There has 
 been much blood shed in this country through their 
 means ; but I am bound to state that the advice of the 
 Liberator is now generally followed (cheers). There 
 are, however, still a few lurking vagabonds in this 
 country. But their ' occupation is nearly gone.' 
 Therefore, if any man ask you to violate the law, seize 
 him, grapple with him, drag him before a magistrate, 
 or your clergyman ; for depend upon it he is your 
 enemy, and an enemy to your country. Follow the 
 advice of O'Connell, be temperate, moral, peaceable, 
 and you will advance your country, ameliorate your 
 condition, and the blessing of God will attend you 
 (loud cheers)." 
 
 It was a fortunate thing for the poor that my father
 
 246 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 f 
 
 purchased Longfield, for he made the best use of his 
 means to give them employment during the times of 
 the famine. Such of the old gentry as could manage to 
 hold on were terribly crippled in their means by the fall- 
 ing off of the rents, and consequently they had no money 
 to spare for labour that was not immediately remunera- 
 tive. My father was not only a landowner, he was 
 also a man of business, and with the money that came 
 in to him daily from his car establishment he right- 
 eously and honestly laboured to relieve the suffering 
 poor. 
 
 I cannot do better than here give the substance of what 
 I took down from the dictation of Jemmy Ryan, one of 
 my father's small tenants. He had evidently prepared 
 his statements, and I have the fullest belief in his 
 trustworthiness. 
 
 " When ' The hunger ' came among the people, the 
 small tenants came to my father and said that they would 
 surrender, that they could hold on no longer. He told 
 them to keep where they were and that he would assist 
 them. They told him then that it was impossible, that 
 they could hold no longer. He then sent them to Ame- 
 rica, and put money into their pockets. Since then he 
 has received letters from them thanking him for his 
 kindness, and blessing the day he sent them away." 
 Perhaps a stranger may not realise the terrible meaning 
 of " The hunger," as applied to the famine times, or all 
 that is conveyed to an Irish ear by the phrase, " they 
 could hold no longer." " Holding on " to a farm during 
 the famine meant such a terrible struggle with want,
 
 LONGFIELD. 247 
 
 misery, and wretchedness as would now be difficult to 
 conceive. It was in the years 1848, 1849 that the ten 
 or twelve small tenants surrendered their holdings and 
 went to America. 
 
 My father was very fond of ship-shaping his land, as 
 he used to call it : that is, when one tenant from any 
 cause went away he would try and divide the land into 
 symmetrical portions. He had long been wanting to 
 acquire for his own use the small holding of Jemmy 
 Ryan, one of his small tenants. He had asked Jemmy 
 four times to sell his bit of land, and four times Jemmy 
 had refused to accede. At last Jemmy consented to 
 take 20 for his small holding, thinking that with 
 the money he could emigrate to America. He himself 
 is my informant of my father's proceedings, and he 
 told me how when he had nearly made up his mind to 
 go abroad my father came one day into his cottage to 
 pay a visit to his wife. "Mrs. Ryan," said Charles 
 Bianconi, " I have agreed with your husband for 20. 
 You are a delicate woman, and it will kill you to 
 cross the sea. Take a friend's advice, and if he goes 
 away do not you go with him." Here was a nice 
 announcement for Master Jemmy. He thought that 
 my father might have minded his own business with- 
 out coming to interfere with his. However, my father 
 finished by saying that he would give Mrs. Ryan the 
 cottage and haggard rent free for her life, and that he 
 strongly counselled her husband to stop where he was 
 and do his work at home. The offer was too good a 
 one to be refused lightly, and Jemmy consented to stay ;
 
 248 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 but he told me that while the 20 was still burning 
 in his pocket he often set off to go to my father to 
 tell him that he must go away, and that when he got up 
 to the door of the house his courage failed him, and 
 he always returned leaving his word unsaid. Jemmy 
 Ryan still dwells on the estate. His known honesty 
 of purpose, his power of endurance and of resistance 
 to the wiles of the weaker sex commended him to my 
 father during the famine weeks ; and it certainly required 
 some skill and considerable firmness of temper to 
 manage forty-four Tipperary women, as not unfre- 
 quently fell to his lot. 
 
 In 1848 my father began his drainage works when he 
 saw the hunger setting in through the land. At that time 
 a labouring man would only earn 8d. a day ; but the 
 drainage works were mostly paid piece-work ; so that a 
 diligent ablebodied man would earn nine shillings a 
 week, and there were few who earned less than six, a 
 fourth more than could be got by ordinary day labour. 
 It is true that the work was severe, and that many of 
 the men had to be standing in the water for several 
 hours in the day. But big strong men came flocking 
 in from all parts of the neighbouring country. The 
 steward remonstrated at this, wishing to confine the 
 work to the men of the parish, but my father turned 
 round upon him and said sternly, " I don't care 
 where a hungry man comes from, I'll employ him." 
 Jemmy Ryan tells me now that he is certain that for 
 a considerable time there were more than a hundred 
 men empl'oyed. Thank God no one died from want
 
 LONGFIELD. 249 
 
 at Longfield, but there were some poor old people who 
 died in the workhouse. 
 
 One day my father said, " All the men are employed 
 to be sure, but I want to do something for the women." 
 So he broke up his good grass land and set flax and 
 potatoes on it. Though the potatoes were then being 
 sold in the market at 8cl. or Wd. a stone, he sold them 
 to his people for 4d. ; and he so continued to sell them 
 up to the date of his death, no matter what the market 
 price for them might be. 
 
 From March to November in that year Jemmy Ryan 
 was appointed commander-in-chief over forty Amazons 
 who were employed in preparing the ground for flax. 
 This lasted until the month of May, when it was set. 
 Once set, the place was nearly left alone till August, 
 when, as the pretty little blue flowers began to wane, 
 the flax was pulled, dried, and prepared for the market. 
 It was usually sold in Clonmel. The people, however, 
 clung to the potatoes ; but even at first there was a 
 very large proportion of black ones among them, the 
 number of black potatoes increasing by degrees till 
 there was only a small fraction of them fit for human 
 food. My husband has told that during these times he 
 has seen the crows on the hill-side in Kerry staggering 
 from want of food. 
 
 Building, draining, striving to grow potatoes, and 
 other attempts, some of them strange enough, to relieve 
 the distress of the poor, all went on together. Grievous 
 as the misery was, I think my father liked the fact of 
 having a dozen irons in the fire all red hot at once. In
 
 250 CHAKLES BIANCONI. 
 
 these bad times Ned Myers, one of the smaller tenants, 
 much amused my father by his ingenuity in walking to 
 Cashel in time for early mass, and then afterwards offi- 
 ciating as clerk in the Protestant church, taking care 
 not to say Amen when he did not approve of the doctrine. 
 My father could not resist telling the story to the son of 
 an English bishop ; it then got abroad, and rather 
 against his will the excellent parson of the village, who 
 was too deaf to know whether his clerk had responded or 
 not, was obliged to dismiss him and replace him by a 
 Protestant. My father felt some remorse for having 
 peached upon poor Ned Myers, but he made it up to 
 him afterwards in some other way. 
 
 Jemmy Ryan has told me that once he was going 
 with some cattle to a farm of my father's in county 
 Galway, and he stopped very early in the morning to 
 redden his pipe at a cabin on the roadside. The good 
 woman had not yet lit her fire, but begged Jemmy to 
 wait a bit, adding that he would go along the road for 
 five miles before he came to another cabin that had a 
 roof to it. Jemmy stayed and lit his pipe, and found 
 it to be a long five Irish miles before he came to a 
 cabin that was covered over at the top. This does not 
 in the least surprise me, for many and many were the 
 roofless houses that I saw in those days in Munster. The 
 horrible famine, with its want, misery, and desolation, 
 cast a gloom over my childhood. I have witnessed 
 scenes which then took place that I shall never forget ; 
 and there are no doubt others who could tell tales of 
 horror quite as heartrending as mine.
 
 LONGFIELD. -251 
 
 I will now insert a short narrative of Mr. Michael 
 Angelo Hayes, saying something about Longfield, and 
 about my father's dealings with his tenants. 
 
 " The first time I saw Longfield Bianconi had been 
 there for some years. It was on his birthday, which 
 he always celebrated by a .large dinner-party, and I 
 think it was in the year 1853. I met his son, then 
 just of age, outside the avenue-gate, driving a well- 
 appointed drag and four horses. He at once offered me 
 a seat by him on the box, and drove me all round the 
 estate. I noticed that Bianconi had built substantial 
 two-storied houses with slated roofs for some of his 
 tenants, and that he had made many improvements 
 in fencing and in draining. He had, consequently, 
 rather offended the susceptibilities of the landed gentry 
 whose property surrounded his. They did not like the 
 idea that a new and self-made man should make such 
 innovations, and seemingly instruct them in their 
 duties to their tenants. For though well-built houses 
 with slated roofs are common enough in farms in 
 England, it was comparatively rare to see then in 
 Ireland a comfortable farmhouse with any other roof 
 but a thatch. It is possible that . Bianconi may have 
 been a little ostentatious in his improvements, and that 
 if he had taken a little more time about them, and used 
 a little more tact, he would have followed a more prudent 
 course. As it was, the gentry were apt to look coldly 
 on him, and to hold themselves aloof; but he had a 
 great independence of character, and he cared little for 
 their antagonism, or at all events he appeared to be
 
 252 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 callous to it. He followed his own way, and in the 
 end he achieved his purpose, and as he became known 
 he was always esteemed and respected. 
 
 " The father of the late owner of Longfield had been 
 shot dead close to the house, and when Bianconi 
 bought the property he found the house defended and 
 barricaded like a fortress. He never disturbed the 
 thick-plated iron that was on the doors, nor did he 
 meddle with the ponderous bars and bolts. He rather 
 took a pleasure in showing them to visitors, and 
 glorying in the fact that he did not require such 
 defences. It certainly was a strange state of society in 
 Ireland when Bianconi was there as a young man. 
 The landed gentry lived like conquerors in a county 
 surrounded by a people who were openly hostile to 
 them, who both hated and feared them, who were 
 slavishly subservient and bitterly antagonistic. And 
 Bianconi, as a landed proprietor, did not wholly escape 
 from falling under the common ban. There was much 
 in his character that would cause misunderstanding and 
 ill-feeling. In principle he was inexorable, he would 
 lose a ship for a halfpenny-worth of tar, and although 
 a most honourable and upright man, he was hard, and 
 in a bargain he was exacting. It is said that he was 
 marked out to be shot ; it was even thought that the 
 deed had been planned and attempted, and frustrated 
 only by the parish priest, who asked him to take a seat 
 in his gig on his way home from Cashel. Bianconi 
 had driven in from Longfield in his own carriage, but 
 he accepted the priest's invitation, and went back with
 
 LOXGFIELD. 253 
 
 him. Now there are two roads leading from Cashel 
 towards Longfield House, and the priest chose the 
 longer of the two. ' Why do you take this road ? ' said 
 Bianconi. ' I prefer it,' replied the priest, and noth- 
 ing more was said then about it, but it was suspected 
 that the old priest had heard something, or got some 
 warning, for it afterwards became known that a party 
 of men had that night been watching on the other 
 road. Whatever cause for dissatisfaction existed, or 
 was supposed to exist, was only temporary. Bianconi 
 was a popular man, and was undoubtedly a good land- 
 lord; but his strict sense of justice as between man and 
 man may not always have accorded with the illogical 
 and one-sided views of a shrewd, suspicious, and ill- 
 educated class of men. I believe, however, and hope 
 that the Irish peasantry are improving. Let us 
 recollect that until the suppression of the penal laws 
 there was very much against which they had to contend. 
 " Bianconi had a great fancy for acquiring landed 
 property, and he made purchases in several districts. 
 The last act of his life was the buying of a small 
 property near Clonmel. The purchase was completed, 
 or just about to be completed, when death at last over- 
 took him. His own account of a purchase he had made 
 some years before in the Landed Estates Court amused 
 me much. He had been watching the sale of a property 
 near the mountain called the ' Devil's Bit/ in county 
 Tipperary, and after he was declared the purchaser, 
 a well-known land-agent and solicitor of CLonmel said 
 to him, ' Do you know the kind of property you are just
 
 254 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 after buying ? ' Bianconi replied that he knew little 
 or nothing about it. ' Well, they are there the most 
 lawless set of ruffians in the whole county ; there's no 
 getting a farthing of rent out of any one of the tenants.' 
 ' Oh murder ! ' cried Bianconi, ' I'm ruined entirely ; 
 what will I do ? ' However, there was no help for it ; 
 the property was his. He told me that when he made 
 his first visit to the estate, he called together all the 
 tenants, and said to them that he made it a rule not to 
 have any tenants on any estate of his who would not 
 take a lease. ' A lease, your honour ! ' they answered, 
 ' what would the like of us do with a lease ? ' At the 
 same time, Bianconi told me, they were all dying to 
 have leases. ' Every man,' he said, ' must have a lease 
 on my property. I will give you all leases upon 
 Griffiths' valuation.' The valuations were ascertained 
 and put at greater rents than they had hitherto paid, 
 and the result was that he had no tenants on any 
 property who were more punctual in paying their 
 rents ; and they afterwards became orderly, industrious, 
 and thriving. 
 
 " I have spent many pleasant days at Longfield 
 House. 'The old Governor,' as he was generally 
 called in the family circle, was very hospitable. He 
 was a most kind and genial host, and he loved to see 
 his old friends round his table, especially upon his 
 birthday. Men of note, either in politics, or literature, 
 or art, were well received at Longfield ; and strangers 
 visiting that part of Ireland usually managed to get an 
 introduction to Charles Bianconi, and were always
 
 LONGFIELD. 255 
 
 hospitably welcomed. He was fond of art, and had 
 collected some good pictures, together with some bad 
 ones. He once came across an ancient-looking oil- 
 painting, which he thought was especially good, but 
 wishing to have another man's opinion, he sent the 
 picture down by the Clonmel car to a Mr. Anthony, of 
 Piltown, who was known to be a man of taste and 
 judgment. "With the picture Bianconi also sent a short 
 note : 
 
 " ' MY DEAR ANTHONY, I send you a Saint Aloy- 
 osious. I think it a good thing. 
 
 " ' Yours truly, 
 
 " ' C. BIANCONI.' 
 
 " The next car from Clonmel brought back the 
 picture, together with the following reply : 
 
 " ' MY DEAR BIANCONI, Your picture is more like a 
 devil than a saint. 
 
 " * Yours truly, 
 
 "'T. ANTHONY.' 
 
 " Bianconi was not long settled in Longfield when he 
 took the fancy to build a mortuary chapel on his estate, 
 as a last resting-place for himself and his family. It 
 was almost the only hobby of his life. And he set to 
 work, unaided by any architect, or even a builder, but 
 with the help of a few artisans in his neighbourhood 
 he constructed a wonderful little chapel. It was very 
 substantially built of limestone and grey sandstone.
 
 256 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 He joined a flat-roofed Italian campanile, or bell-tower, 
 to a Gothic steep-roofed chapel. And on my pointing 
 out the incongruity to him, he said, 'Well, what 
 matter; does it not look very handsome?' He must 
 have spent over a thousand pounds on the building. Yet 
 it was small, and practically useless. He had a very 
 fine bell hung in the campanile, and it surprised me 
 that, without any advice, he hung the bell in the only 
 proper way that it could be hung, from a wooden 
 platform or framework resting upon a projection of the 
 wall. Most men would probably have built the sup- 
 ports into the wall, and the vibration thus caused by 
 the ringing of the bell would have been ruinous to the 
 structure." 
 
 I here interrupt Mr. Hayes to say a few words about 
 the mortuary chapel. I forget the exact date when it 
 was consecrated, but I know it was a bright clear day 
 in the autumn. The chapel was filled with priests chant- 
 ing the service, and outside the people were collected 
 in great numbers in the little cemetery outside. The 
 Rev. Dr. Leahy presided, and he sang his part of the 
 ceremony in a beautifully clear high -pitched voice. 
 He then went round the graveyard, followed by the 
 priests and the people in procession. 
 
 A short time afterwards, my sister's remains were 
 brought over from Italy, where she had died. She was 
 the first person buried in the little chapel. She had a 
 large funeral, though I was not present. Our well- 
 to-do neighbours wished to be civil to my father, and 
 the poor gratefully remembered her constant kindness
 
 LONGFIELD. 257 
 
 to them. Benzoni executed her monument. It is a 
 high entablature, with a bas-relief below. The upper 
 part contains a niche, with a very beautiful standing 
 figure of the Angel of Purity holding a lily in her hand. 
 Below, the dead girl is laid on her couch ; Faith and 
 Hope, in the usual female forms, are at her head and 
 feet. Charity is boldly symbolized by the highest type of 
 Divine love the child Jesus held in his mother's arms, 
 stretching out his hands towards the sleeping figure. 
 The inscription merely mentions the date and place of 
 her birth and death, and that the monument was 
 erected by Charles Bianconi in memory of his beloved 
 daughter, Kate Henrietta. Her full name was 
 Catherine, but I think it was a touch of sentiment that 
 made my father put her name Kate instead. My sister 
 and my brother, with his little baby daughter, my 
 husband, and my own little Elizabeth, all lie in the 
 same vault ; and my father lies alone right opposite to 
 the altar. As yet the only bodies in the churchyard 
 are those of Mr. and Miss O'Leary, our old nurse, 
 Mrs. Catherine Curtain, who died* here at Longfield 
 after being with us for forty-two years, and who wished 
 to be buried near to Kate, her foster-child, and two 
 decent old men, John Mathews and Patrick Dunne, the 
 steward. Poor old John Mathews had been for many 
 years a driver, and afterwards he became a man in 
 charge in the yard. He died at an advanced age, only 
 four years before his old master. 
 
 " In the year 1851 Bianconi revisited Italy with his 
 family. He stopped for some time in Milan, not very 
 
 s
 
 258 CHARLES BIAXCOXI. 
 
 far from where he was born, and met several of his 
 relatives, but most of those whom he remembered had 
 been dead long since. He left Italy at a time when the 
 French dominated in the country, and he now found it 
 in the hands of the Austrians. He went on to Rome, 
 and stopped there for some months. His son was 
 appointed one of the chamberlains at the Papal Court, 
 and the old man was everywhere well received. But I 
 do not think he found the life and habits of the people 
 of his native country were much to his taste. He had 
 grown up and lived under a different system, and in 
 the country of his adoption he had become more Irish 
 than the Irish themselves. He had imbibed too much 
 of the spirit of liberty. He found himself out of unison 
 with all the surroundings, and he longed to return to 
 what he felt had become his home. When he came 
 back, he simply said that there were a great many 
 things in Italy that required to be changed. 
 
 " Bianconi had bought property in the borough of 
 Cashel, the ancient city of the kings, and at the next 
 election that followed his purchase he became angry 
 with his tenants because they did not vote as he wished. 
 Towards the close of his life he got fat, but he continued 
 to be as active and as energetic as he had ever been. 
 He travelled about a great deal. He was constantly 
 going from one town to another, and he used to say 
 that he was only a lodger at home. He sat at petty 
 sessions and at poor-law boards ; he attended railway 
 meetings, political gatherings, and charitable bazaars. 
 He supported every desirable public object, and was
 
 LONGFIELD. "259 
 
 very liberal in his charities. The world throve with 
 him, and everything that he put his hand to succeeded, 
 
 "His son married a grand-daughter of Daniel 
 O'Connell, and he had three daughters, but no son, 
 He died in 1864 at the early age of thirty-one. The 
 death of his son and the fact of there being no male 
 heir to carry on. the name of Bianconi was a grief 
 and disappointment to the old man ; but outwardly 
 he showed no sign. Pity or sympathy were dis- 
 tasteful to his proud nature. He saw his son laid 
 in his little mortuary chapel beside the remains of 
 his daughter Kate, and though his death deeply 
 afflicted him he bore the blow with all the fortitude of 
 a Stoic. 
 
 " His second daughter, Mary Anne, married in 18C5 
 Morgan John O'Connell, the nephew of the ' Libe- 
 rator,' as Dan O'Connell was generally designated 
 in Ireland by his friends and followers. Morgan 
 John made an excellent husband, and he and his wife 
 lived very happily. They passed much of their time at 
 Longfield, where I used frequently to meet him. He was 
 an accomplished and a most perfect gentleman, whose 
 knowledge of men and things was almost universal. 
 He was gifted with rare conversational powers; his 
 anecdotes and his wit were always pleasing. He had 
 sat for many years as member of Parliament for Kerry; 
 he had lived much in London, and he seemed to know 
 everybody. He had two children, one of whom only 
 survives a boy and he seems destined to bear the 
 name of Bianconi according to the old man's will. The
 
 260 CHAELES BIAXCOKI. 
 
 little fellow was very fond of his grandfather, and when 
 at Longfield I have often been struck with the picture 
 of the fair-haired child playing by the side of the aged, 
 grey-haired man as he sat in his arm-chair. Bian- 
 coni would listen with such evident pleasure to the 
 prattle of his ' little John ; ' and I thought of how it 
 has been said that fathers live over again in their 
 children's offspring. 
 
 " His last work was the finishing of the Glebe 
 House on his estate. It was well and substantially 
 built, and he made it over in perpetuity, together 
 with four or five acres of land, to the parish priest 
 for the time being, conditional upon a certain number 
 of masses being said at stated times in the mortuary 
 chapel. 
 
 " Morgan John O'Connell died at Longfield on the 
 2nd July, 1875. He was much younger than Bianconi, 
 and I little thought that the old man would out- 
 live his son-in-law. His death was a great shock to 
 him, for 'a little before he himself had had a slight 
 attack of paralysis not the first and he had lost the 
 use of his right hand and could no longer write. As I 
 saw him seated in his chair looking through the window 
 upon the funeral cortege as it passed down the avenue, 
 I thought he must have regarded it as a rehearsal of 
 what was soon to take place in his own person. 
 
 " Sooner, indeed, than I expected, in the September 
 following, within a few days of the anniversary of his 
 birth, which we had often celebrated so joypusly around 
 his hospitable table, I followed his remains to the
 
 LOXGFIELD. 261 
 
 mortuary chapel in Boherlahan, and saw him laid in 
 his last resting-place with the same feelings of grief 
 with which I saw my own dear father laid in his grave 
 at Glassnevin. Peace be to the ashes of my oldest and 
 dearest friend." 
 
 I quite agree with Mr. Hayes that my father rather 
 gloried in tread ing on other people's corns, and I can easily 
 understand that the whilom alien Papist, now become 
 an Irish squire, asserted himself rather unpleasantly to 
 many of his Tory neighbours. I know he was some- 
 times indignant at not being called to serve on a Grand 
 Jury when small Cromwellian squires were summoned. 
 However, by degrees he got to be more easy-going, and 
 he became on intimate terms with his neighbours, from 
 whom he received much friendliness and attention. My 
 father was a tolerably active justice, and he was 
 eminently a poor man's magistrate. The people had 
 the fullest confidence in him, and he in them. Though 
 he would talk very inagniloquently about putting down 
 drink, he seldom endeavoured to have a man severely 
 punished for it. 
 
 During the famine time he hit upon a rather ingenious 
 expedient. He would remit a considerable portion of 
 rent from the tenants, and take from them their oats 
 instead, giving them the full market value. The people 
 knew that they were not being cheated in their bar- 
 gains ; and in his establishment, where there were over 
 a thousand horses, the consumption of oats was neces- 
 sarily very large. 
 
 I have a strong suspicion that my father looked upon
 
 262 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 his property as a luxurious Lobby, for in no part of the 
 management of his estates was he so methodical or so 
 fcusiness-like as he was in his car establishment. I have 
 teen driven to the verge of distraction over ledgers and 
 bills of costs, trying to trace certain payments and dates 
 of purchase, which one would naturally imagine should 
 l>e indicated in the foremost place. For instance, in the 
 ledger where his landed purchases are entered, neither 
 the dates of purchase nor the English acreage are given. 
 As to his farming he never had anything like a system. 
 He bought every kind of machinery, except steam 
 machinery, that was ever invented. Besides all the 
 American and English machines, he adopted the local 
 belief in grubbers, which about here are much ia repute. 
 These he generally got made by a smith on the estate. 
 His- pay-sheet used to average from 15 to 20 a week, 
 and he used to employ the old people as long as they 
 could continue to work. In the palmy days of the 
 Bians he was always able to provide employment for 
 the boys and young men on the property. He had a 
 great fancy for what he called manufacturing his own 
 timber; he would put fresh Irish timber into every 
 kind of woodwork. His head carpenter lived in a per- 
 petual state of petty warfare with him about the 
 " Master's notions of the art." Many a time in the 
 heat of an argument they would both be seen, their 
 spectacles on their foreheads, fighting desperately over 
 a sketch or an estimate. 
 
 At different times he devoted himself to long-wool 
 sheep and Berkshire pigs. Though he paid long prices
 
 LOXGFIELD. 263 
 
 for his sheep, he never could be got to see that high- 
 bred animals of all sorts require delicate treatment, and 
 as he often overstocked his grass land the animals 
 rather dwindled down under a course of low diet. The 
 symmetrical Berkshire pigs were his last fancy, and for 
 their accommodation he built elegant pigsties on a plan 
 that he got from a model farm. He used to delight in 
 having the nursing mothers and their broods let out, 
 and seeing the little ones running round about him 
 and grunting, as he sat in his wheeled chair. While I 
 candidly admit the superiority of these Berkshire 
 pigs in some points, truth compels me to say that the 
 native long-sided Irish pig produces a longer flitch 
 and a more streaky mixture of fat and lean than those 
 of the more fashionable breed. Fond as my father was 
 of improving the condition of his people, he did not 
 encourage them to keep pigs ; and I fancy the reason 
 was that the profit arising from them after they were 
 bought and killed was so very small. 
 
 But he made a special point of always selling picked 
 potatoes at 4d. a stone, and of finding employment 
 for those who were willing to work. He would also sell 
 his timber at a low price, a great boon where peat 
 was both scarce and dear. 
 
 Until the Bian establishment was sold the place 
 was overrun with screws of all sorts. There was a 
 regular infirmary in some of the swampy fields where 
 the animals, after they had been blistered or fired, &c., 
 were turned out to graze and take care of themselves. 
 A busy and active man as my father was, I think he
 
 264 CHARLES BIAXCOXI. 
 
 enjoyed extremely the delights of squiredom. He 
 knew that he could not have good things without pay- 
 ing for them, and when he wanted good things he 
 bought them ; and he took such evident pleasure in doing 
 what he could for himself. I have already said that 
 his finger was in every pie within his reach ; and occa- 
 sionally, if the pie was not within his reach, he would 
 walk towards the pie. Having so many horses laid up, 
 he must perforce constitute himself their doctor. And 
 I am bound to say that in many cases he doctored suc- 
 cessfully. Sometimes he would hardly leave himself a 
 winter stocking, and many a debilitated animal would 
 be seen limping about with my father's long grey hose 
 filled with alum curds carefully gartered round his 
 legs. For starts and strains, muscular weaknesses, or 
 stiffness, to which the hind legs of coach-horses are liable, 
 my father pinned his faith to alum curds in a knitted 
 stocking. And he considered ploughing in tips a certain 
 cure for all the foot disorders that come from fast work 
 on the road. 
 
 But why, with so much horse-power at his command, 
 he should have taken to ploughing with horned cattle, 
 no one could ever divine. I rather think it was the 
 recollection of what he had seen in Italy that made him 
 take up this freak. For three or four years he kept two 
 teams of horned cattle, and gave it up only, he said, 
 because they were so slow that they wasted the time of 
 the men. He had one pet bull that he called " Flying 
 Dutchman," and I have seen my brother put this beast 
 into a break when he was training a fine but dreadfully
 
 LOXGFIELD. 265 
 
 obstinate jibbing mare, whom not even the stoutest 
 horse could induce to move, and the bull would resolutely 
 put down his horns, and pull the break along, half 
 strangling the mare in her collar as she was dragged 
 along sorely against her will. 
 
 My father had an axiom, in which I am glad to say 
 that so great an authority as Baron Liebig agrees : 
 " The Manure is the Farmer," and he would lay down 
 this dictum with all the authority of a judge. He 
 would not content himself with ordinary manure, but 
 he used to buy couch grass at 6d. a load. 
 
 The people were only too glad to get this stuff carted 
 away from off their land. My father used to mix it 
 with the hot stable manure, and he said it answered 
 admirably, his stewards were, I believe, of a different 
 opinion ; and at another time he took a fancy to covering 
 his grass with soot from the chimneys. This did not 
 last long, for it nearly produced a domestic rebellion. 
 The wives of the men declared that they would not let 
 their husbands into their homes before they had washed 
 their clothes, and my father, to excuse himself for his 
 freak, declared that he had to respect the good women 
 as well as his land. 
 
 My father invested all the savings of his life in 
 land. He used to quote the old saying, " Money 
 melts, land holds, while grass grows, and water runs." 
 I will now give a list of the various purchases my father 
 made, and I will insert a few letters. But I will refrain 
 from going into details, as they would not be appre- 
 ciated or understood by an outside public :
 
 266 CHARLES BIAXCOXI. 
 
 
 Date of 
 
 Name of 
 
 
 Acreage 
 
 Acreage 
 
 I 
 
 'urchase. 
 
 Property. 
 
 Cost. 
 
 (Irish). 
 
 (English). 
 
 March 
 
 23rd, 1846 . 
 
 Longfield 
 
 22,000 
 
 . 623 
 
 
 
 1849 . 
 
 Ballygriffin . 
 
 6,000 
 
 . 230 
 
 372 
 
 
 1851 . 
 
 Roan 
 
 3,000 
 
 . 162 
 
 264 
 
 
 1853 . 
 
 Glanaguile 
 
 6,000 
 
 . 988 
 
 . 1,600 
 
 
 1860 . 
 
 Cashel . 
 
 11,900 
 
 . 220 
 
 356 
 
 
 
 Ballinard 
 
 2,300 
 
 . 713 
 
 
 
 
 Knockamora . 
 
 1,620 
 
 . 921 
 
 . . 
 
 
 
 Liss 
 
 9,000 
 
 . 482 
 
 . . 
 
 
 
 Lower Pallas . 
 
 4,550 
 
 . 248 
 
 
 
 
 
 Upper Pallas . 
 
 3,225 
 
 . 367 
 
 . . 
 
 
 
 Hill House 
 
 720 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 70,315 4,954 
 
 " MARETIMO, 19^ September, 1846. 
 
 " MY DEAR BIANCONT, I congratulate Ireland on the 
 valuable acquisition of a humane and national proprietor. 
 You will be just and kind to your tenants, and you will 
 find them grateful. I have always found it so. The 
 Irish have had their nature and character lowered by 
 ill-treatment. They may now wish for some fair play, 
 and they will prove worthy of it. This will be a year 
 of great suffering, but good will, I hope, come from it. 
 I shall not go near Cashel without visiting you. If 
 you have anything to spare from the letter of credit, 
 give it to the Mechanics' Institute, or any charity you 
 approve of, but don't put a word in the paper. 
 " Very faithfully, your obliged, 
 
 " CLONCURRY." 
 
 This letter is from the former owner of Longfield : 
 
 ROYAL HOTEL, llth August, 1854. 
 
 " MY DEAR SIR, I am told I will not know Long-
 
 LOXGFIELD. 267 
 
 field, it is so much improved. How fortunate I was, 
 and bow happy my former tenants have been, because 
 of the selection I made when parting with my pro- 
 perty in Tipperary, which part of Ireland if I ever 
 see again will find me for a few days under your roof, 
 should you be at home. 
 
 " Pray remember me to my old friends and neigh- 
 bours, not forgetting the Rev. Mr. Kirvvan and 
 Mackey ; and tell Denis Dwyer I am alive, though not 
 as active as in former days. 
 
 " With sincere regards to my former tenants now in 
 the land of the living, and best compliments to Mrs. 
 Bianconi and family, 
 
 " My dear sir, very faithfully yours, 
 
 " RICHARD LONG. 
 
 "Charles Bianconi, Esq., Longfield, Cashel." 
 Here is a letter to the Lord Chancellor of Ireland : 
 
 " LONGFIELD, 25th Awymt, 1869. 
 
 " MY DEAR LORD CHANCELLOR, As you must pass 
 " this way on your way home, I am anxious, for many 
 " reasons, you should stop at Longfield for two or three 
 " hours, which would not prevent your reaching Dublin 
 " the same day. 
 
 " My want of education and my original isolated 
 " position has made me a child of nature through 
 " life.
 
 268 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " In 1846, I bought my present residence from 
 " Captain Long. Particulars: 623 Irish acres; rental, 
 " 1,121 ; cost, 22,000. I found landlord, tenants, 
 " and lands very seedy, but an honest and fine race 
 *' of people, many with a grown family of six and 
 " eight children living in a two-roomed mud cabin, 
 " which I replaced with comfortable houses, the tenants 
 " quarrying the stones, and attending tradesmen. 
 
 "From having a spiritless, comfortless, and poor 
 " tenantry, I wish to show you the contrast from 
 " natural causes. 
 
 " I am also anxious to show you my mortuary chapel, 
 " which contains a memorial monument to my daughter 
 " by Benzoni, and though last, but not least, the glebe 
 " house for my P.P., and nine acres of land, con- 
 " veyed for ever to the Commissioners of Charitable 
 " Bequests. 
 
 " I am very anxious that the present Government 
 " should have a proper man as M.P. for this county, 
 " and if Morgan John O'Connell were not connected 
 " with me, he would be the right man in the right 
 *' place, for he is both clever and honest. He 
 " should fight a Tory, but be no candidate against a 
 " Liberal. 
 
 " It is a pity we have no centre in the county. We 
 " are honest and independent, but, individually, we are 
 " very small to one another. We are too suspicious 
 " and selfish, and are still too near the effects of the 
 ** penal code. Could you learn his Grace's views on this 
 " subject ? I hope he will not commit himself again
 
 10XGFIELD. 269 
 
 " with Mr. Munster, by whom he had an infinity of 
 " trouble, and he a perfect stranger. 
 
 "By your leaving Killarney any day at 10.30, you 
 " would get here at 2.18. I would then meet you at 
 " the station, and that would give you time for a race 
 " through Longfield, and I would afterwards leave 
 " you at the station, so that you would be in Dublin 
 " by 9.30. 
 
 " Sincerely yours, 
 
 C. BIAXCOM."
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 LONGFTELD DEALINGS WITH CHURCH AND STATE. 
 
 MY father was not only a landlord and a farmer after 
 his own fashion, but he was an ardent politician and a 
 loyal follower of his Church. He had sundry dealings 
 with the Lord- Lieutenant of the county, and with the 
 Archbishop of the diocese. The Archbishop did not 
 consecrate the mortuary chapel, nor did the Lord- 
 Lieutenant confer on him one of the deputy-lieuten- 
 ancies without a good deal of preliminary discussion. 
 "With regard to the latter I may say it was one of the 
 very few things that my father asked for himself. He 
 had set his heart upon having this appointment, not 
 from any puerile vanity, not from a desire to figure in 
 a red coat, nor yet from a wish to be able to write 
 D.L. after his name, but he thought it would be a 
 formal recognition of the position he had achieved for 
 himself, and he also thought that Catholics had a good 
 right to a certain proportion of the deputy-lieuten- 
 ancies. I will now give a few of the letters that 
 passed between him and Lord Lismore, the Lord- 
 Lieutenant of the county, on the subject
 
 DEALINGS WITH CHURCH AND STATE. 271 
 " LONOFIELD, CASHEL, 29 th January, 1858. 
 
 " MY DEAR LORD LISMORE, I am sorry to find that 
 " Colonel Penefather has been called away from amongst 
 ** us. I now remind you of my claim to be named in 
 " his stead as deputy-lieutenant for the county of 
 " Tipperary, where I possess nine fee-simple estates. 
 " Seven of them I bought in the Encumbered Estates 
 " Court, and for six of which I neither pay crown nor 
 " quit rent. I think it right also to state that of all 
 " the D.L.'s for the county there are only six Roman 
 " Catholics, and therefore the majority of that com- 
 " munity are not adequately represented. 
 
 " My dear Lord, yours very sincerely, 
 
 "C. BIANCONI." 
 
 " 2nd February, 1858. 
 
 " MY DEAR BIANCONI, I have received your letter 
 with the account of Colonel Penefather's death, not the 
 first intimation that I had received. With every wish 
 to oblige you, I do not think it will be in my power to 
 nominate you to the D.L. There are a great many 
 names down, and some of them have been on the list 
 for years. Believe me, there is no person for whom I 
 have a greater regard than yourself, or whom I would 
 sooner oblige. I think the Government is shaky. The 
 India Bill and Clanricarde's appointment will not do 
 them much good. 
 
 " Yours always, 
 
 " LISMORE. 
 
 "41, Wilton Crescent, London."
 
 272 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " LONGFIELD, CASHEL, 5th February, 1858. 
 " MY DEAR LORD, I have to acknowledge your letter 
 " of 2nd inst., and to thank you for your very kind 
 " expressions towards me. They would, however, have 
 " been more gratifying by a present recognition of my 
 <f claims. 
 
 " I understand there are at present three vacancies 
 " on the list of D.L. Should such be the case, you may 
 " probably consider it desirable that one of the three. 
 " should be filled by a Catholic. 
 
 " I am, my dear Lord, very sincerely yours, 
 
 " C. BIAKCONI." 
 
 44 3th February, 1858. 
 
 " MY DEAR BIAXCONI, I am sorry that it is not in 
 my power to give you the D.L. There are not three 
 
 vacancies, only two. 
 
 " Always yours, 
 
 " LISMORE. 
 
 " 41, "Wilton Crescent, London." 
 
 " 15th June, 1863. 
 
 " DEAR MR. BIANCONI, By the death of Mr. 
 O'Maher a vacancy occurs in the D.L.'s. I have very 
 great pleasure to have it in my power to offer it to you, 
 and trusting that you may long be spared to prove to 
 your adopted countrymen what individual energy and 
 perseverance can accomplish, 
 
 " I beg to sign myself, ever yours most sincerely, 
 
 " LISMORE. 
 " 34, Grosrenor Street."
 
 DEALINGS WITH CHURCH AND STATE. 273 
 
 " P.S. I should esteem it a great favour if you would 
 allow me on the occasion of your first presentation, as 
 your fellow-countryman, to have the honour of present- 
 ing you." 
 
 "LoNGFiELD, 17th June, 1863. 
 
 "Many thanks, my dear Lord Lismore, for your 
 " letter of the 15th inst., offering me the vacant D.L. for 
 " this county, which I accept with pleasure. 
 
 " The reading of your postscript filled me with pleas- 
 " ing reminiscences of your venerable and patriarchal 
 " father for his paternity to me, when I was a compara- 
 " tively isolated orphan, by his standing, conjointly with 
 " my late friend Lord Cloncurry, as sponsor to me at my 
 " naturalisation, which laid the foundation stone of my 
 " present position ; and it is a pleasing coincidence 
 " that I should have his son my sponsor at my next 
 " presentation. I hope I may prove as worthy a child 
 " as I have been to my former godfather. 
 
 " I cannot describe to you my feelings of all that I 
 " owe to Providence. 
 
 " I am, my dear Lord, sincerely yours, 
 
 " C. BIANCONI. 
 
 " Right Hon. Lord Lismore, London." 
 
 The following document relating to the mortuary 
 chapel will explain itself: 
 
 " THTJBLBS, 4th Nov., 1869. 
 
 " MY DEAR SIR, I undertake that the parish priest 
 of Boherlahan for the time being for whose use and 
 
 T
 
 274 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 benefit you have built a parochial house, and attached 
 to it a quantity of land, shall punctually celebrate, or 
 get others to celebrate, the number of masses imposed by 
 you, and set out in the trust deed of same holding, and 
 on the days and place named therein. That my suc- 
 cessor may see the fulfilment of this engagement in 
 like manner as I promise to do, I shall have a copy of 
 this letter preserved in the archives of the diocese. 
 
 " PATRICK LEAHY, ! 
 
 " Archbishop of Cashel and Emly. 
 (Seal.) 
 
 " To Charles Bianconi, Esq., Longfield, Cashel." 
 
 The endowment was vested in trustees with the sanc- 
 tion of the Commissioners of Charitable Bequests, but 
 the correspondence and legal arrangements would not 
 be of any particular interest now. 
 
 No one had ever more reason to be thankful that he 
 was a Catholic than had Charles Bianconi when he 
 landed in Ireland as a lad of fifteen or sixteen years of 
 age. The boy found himself thrown among strangers 
 whose manners, customs, and language were unknown 
 to him. The first Sunday that he went to mass, 
 he saw the same ceremonies and heard the same 
 words that had been familiar to him from infancy, and 
 he could there say his prayers as though he had been 
 in his own church at home. There has long been a 
 communication between the priests of Ireland and the
 
 DEALINGS WITH CHURCH AND STATE. 275 
 
 priests of Italy, and in my father's early days that con- 
 nection was very strong. All through the penal times 
 Irishmen had sought education in the colleges and 
 convents abroad, and when the persecution practi- 
 cally had ceased our priests came back to their own 
 country. Clonmel and Waterford were then full of 
 friars who had been educated in Rome, and among 
 these my father found many kind and valuable com- 
 panions. 
 
 He had not been many years in Ireland before he 
 was singing the Gregorian hymns in Cahir, or before 
 he was helping to teach Catechism to the children 
 of Clonmel. In the eyes of the Church all men are 
 equal, and the boy's lonely condition and his homeless- 
 ness commended him the more strongly to the care of 
 these good men. About this time Mr. Rice, a wealthy 
 trader, was giving his life and his money to found an 
 order for the teaching of poor boys, the order was 
 always known as the " Christian Brothers," and my 
 father became deeply impressed with the institution. He 
 was all his life the friend and benefactor of the Chris- 
 tian Brothers. He used to give them twenty suits of 
 clothes every Christmas for their boys, and, failing 
 direct issue, he bequeathed to them the reversion of 
 all his property. 
 
 While my father was still a boy he came under the 
 beneficent influence of Mrs. Tobin, a handsome, stately 
 Ursuline nun, who, when she was the Reverend Mother 
 at Thurles, took young Charles Bianconi under her 
 care. I have heard my father talk of Mrs. Tobin, and
 
 276 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 say that he did not feel afraid of God Almighty, but 
 that he was afraid of Mrs. Tobin. He used to dread 
 her penetrating glances, and her query, " Mr. Charles, 
 when was your last confession?" And after nearly 
 seventy years the man would look shamefaced when he 
 told us of her rebuke for a flippant answer. To her 
 query, "Are you a good boy?" he had replied rather 
 vauntingly, thinking of some mischief he had done, 
 " Not as good as I ought to be." And then she sternly 
 answered him, " If you are not a good boy, you ought 
 to be ashamed to tell it." 
 
 My father has told me of the good and kindness this 
 warm-hearted woman did him. Through her he was 
 brought into the society of cultivated women, and when 
 he was in the convent parlour he could sit down 
 without thinking of the nails in his brogues, or of 
 his parcel of prints. He was not then buying or 
 selling, or made uneasy as to his footing in the house- 
 hold. 
 
 My father was at all times a great advocate for the 
 education of children. He was one of the few who 
 supported both the Christian Brothers and the National 
 Schools. He always gave me 18 a-year to give away 
 in prizes to the children of the schools on his property ; 
 and at my sister's desire he endowed a small sum of 
 money towards the breakfast fund of the children 
 attending the Nuns' National School in Cashel. I rather 
 think he had an idea that as opposition fosters and 
 improves trade, it equally improves and stimulates educa- 
 tion. I find a letter from Lord Cloncurry, and it therein
 
 DEALINGS WITH CHURCH AND STATE. 277 
 
 appears that the patriotic and astute politician had 
 not quite grasped my father's opposition theory. And 
 it was very funny to complain of the excellent old 
 parish priest to my father, for there was a considerable 
 amount of sly political antagonism between them. It 
 was Father Bourke who had not inaptly styled my 
 father " the wily Italian." 
 
 "MY DEAR BIANCONI, When I took the liberty 
 to constitute you my almoner for 50, my wish was 
 that you should expend that small sum as most agree- 
 able to your kind heart and good sense. I pray you 
 to do so. 
 
 " The money I sent to the Very Rev. Mr. Bourke 
 he applies to schools opposed, as I understand, to the 
 National system. I have given him full liberty to do 
 so, as I am much obliged to him for his very kind ser- 
 vices to my son. But I am very sorry that a sensible 
 gentleman should be opposed to the National system, 
 which, with the approbation of all the Catholic bishops, 
 I got established, after a war of twenty years against 
 the Kildare establishment. 
 
 "It is a great pity not to let our good people 
 profit by a means of education without any inter- 
 ference with the religious opinions of anybody. I 
 fear the Repeal cause will suffer much by the divisions 
 which have taken place amongst its friends. Young 
 Ireland is vain and rather thoughtless. But O'Connell 
 had no right to repudiate them, or to turn informer
 
 278 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 against the Nation paper, whose spirit and talent does 
 great honour to Ireland. 
 
 " I hope both parties will see their error. 
 
 " I am, dear Bianconi, truly yours, 
 
 " CLONCURRY. 
 
 " 9th November, 1846." 
 
 The Synod of Thurles, held in 1850, decided to found 
 a Catholic University, as opposed to the Queen's colleges 
 or, as they were called, the Godless colleges, because 
 in these institutions religious instruction formed no part 
 of the course of education. Dr. Newman was installed 
 as first Rector of the University in Dublin on the 4th 
 June 1854. 
 
 Though my father was rather fond of talking about 
 what he called his " uneducation," he took a strong 
 interest in, and was a warm supporter of, the Uni- 
 versity. Writing afterwards to Sir Robert Peel, he 
 says : "I am one of those laymen who took an active 
 
 J J 
 
 " part in the establishment of the Catholic University, 
 " under the conviction that such an institute was indis- 
 " pensable for the proper education of our Catholic 
 " youth." He was made one of the auditors, and held 
 this appointment for two years, but he took no other 
 part in the management of the College. 
 
 Monsignore "Woodlock, who became rector after 
 Dr. Newman resigned, tells me that my father was one 
 of the first and best friends of the Catholic University, 
 and that it was through him that their principal house 
 in Dublin,. No. 86, Stephen's Green, South, was pur- 
 chased in trust for the University.
 
 DEALINGS WITH CHURCH AND STATE. 279 
 
 It was a peculiarity of my father's to do a great 
 deal of his almsgiving through the clergy. He was so 
 ready to take trouble himself, that he had no scruple in 
 giving trouble to others, and specially to our good old 
 friend, the Rev. Dr. Leahy, the late Archbishop of 
 Cashel. My father also had a special sympathy for poor 
 old maids, and for decayed gentlewomen ; and I find 
 evident traces, in his letters and in letters that have 
 been addressed to him, of how he always stuck to any 
 one whom he had once taken up. I find some of the 
 saddest tales of genteel poverty among his papers. For 
 orphanages and the sick poor, he never could refuse a 
 claim made upon him ; and wherever the Bians went, 
 he used to give to the local charities. He certainly 
 gave away a great deal of money in alms during his 
 lifetime, but after his death he left nothing to cha- 
 ritable institutions of any kind or description. 
 
 Irish people look upon the Castle in Dublin as a sort 
 of symbol of government, a combination of St. James's 
 Palace and "Whitehall. My father's first connection with 
 the Castle was in the time of Mr. Drummond, when he 
 was the Irish Secretary ; but it was not till some years 
 after that he was formally presented at Court. Earl 
 Bessborough was the first Lord-Lieutenant whose guest 
 my father was. My father had sent in a petition asking 
 that a friend of his might be appointed to a certain post 
 then vacant, and Lord Bessborough had replied, "I 
 will give you the post for your friend if you will come 
 and dine to-morrow." My father made some demur 
 about going to dine at the Castle, as he had never
 
 280 CHARLES BIAXCONI. 
 
 attended a levee, but his objection was overruled ; lie 
 was told to attend the levees in future. And he was 
 specially enjoined that at dinner he was to tell his 
 famous story of earning a shilling a day and living on 
 eightpence. The story was intended, I believe, to be a 
 moral lesson for a relative of Lord Bessborough's who 
 had unsuccessfully tried the opposite plan. And my 
 husband, who was at the dinner, was much pleased with 
 the story, and rather proudly imagined that it was 
 meant for him. 
 
 My father's special Viceroy was Lord Carlisle, and for 
 him he had a most affectionate admiration. How that 
 painfully popular man must have dreaded the very sight 
 of Charles Bianconi ! When my father's mind was 
 full of any social grievance, when he thought 1 the state 
 of the country was worse than usual, when the Tories 
 and the priests were aggravating the Liberal Govern- 
 ment, he would go and lay siege to Lord Carlisle, who 
 always received him with the most gracious affability. 
 Before a general election he would go and ask Lord 
 Carlisle how he should dispose of his thirty-two votes 
 in the manner most agreeable to the Liberal Groy em- 
 inent ; and then for a few days and nights he would 
 rush about frantically, voting, as it would seem, in a 
 dozen places at once. It was very amusing to see how 
 thoroughly my father enjoyed being made much of at 
 the Castle. Whenever we went to any of the festivities 
 there the high official people always took notice of him, 
 and presented him to the distinguished foreigner of the 
 hour.
 
 DEALINGS WITH CHUECH AND STATE. 281 
 
 On one occasion, in writing to Lord Carlisle, my 
 father allowed his feelings to get the better of him. 
 
 t 
 
 " LONOFIKLD, 22nd February, 1864. 
 
 " MY LORD, I fear my anxiety for the sustentation 
 " of the present Government, and my sincere respect 
 "for your Excellency, personally and publicly, may 
 " carry me beyond my duty by bringing to your notice 
 " the strange way in which the patronage of this 
 " country has of late been administered. Since the 1st 
 " of January 1862, nine resident magistrates have been 
 " appointed, namely, seven Protestants and two Roman 
 " Catholics, and, though the Catholic population has 
 " greatly decreased, we are still in an immense ma- 
 " jority, almost as great as the inverse ratio of the above 
 " proportions," as adopted by the Government in our 
 " regard, which is a queer way of rewarding the loyalty 
 " and sound morality of this country. 
 
 " In my former communications I called your Ex- 
 " cellency's attention to the debt the British Govern- 
 " ment owed to the late Daniel O'Connell, who 
 " spent his life educating the people to an obedience 
 " of the laws, &c., &c., the many millions saved there- 
 " by in the subsequent government of this country 
 
 " as portion of the empire. Mr. , a connec- 
 
 " tion of the late Daniel O'Connell, than whom there 
 " cannot be a more desirable person to fill the office, 
 " is candidate for the office of resident magistrate, 
 " and your conferring on him the next vacancy will
 
 282 CHARLES BIAXCONI. 
 
 " enable you not only to do an act of justice to the 
 " memory of the great man to whom so much is due, 
 " but also will add a most valuable member to that 
 " body. It will be very popular, give general satisfac- 
 " tion, and considerably remove from the friends of the 
 " Government the mortification they have felt by the 
 " recent appointments. 
 
 u I am, my Lord, very sincerely yours, 
 
 " C. BlANCONI." 
 
 " DUBLIN CASTLE, 2&th February, 1864. 
 
 " DEAR MR. BIANCONI, I have always endeavoured 
 to show, in my manner, the sincere deference I feel for 
 your career and character, but I cannot pretend to be 
 pleased with your last letter. 
 
 " In the first place, it would be correct to state that 
 three Catholic resident magistrates have been appointed 
 within the last two years. I will not inquire too strictly 
 into the amount of the support which Lord Palmerston 
 is now receiving from the Catholic body, but I feel con- 
 scious that I have not been wanting in my efforts to do 
 justice to the members of that body. 
 
 " With respect to O'Connell, I fully agree with you 
 as to the splendid service he rendered to his country in 
 the matter of Catholic Emancipation. In the agitation 
 for Repeal, I think he did very great mischief; he 
 produced a schism in the Liberal ranks of which we 
 still feel the evil effects. But I must utterly deny that 
 successive Liberal Governments have shown themselves
 
 DEALINGS WITH CHURCH AND STATE. 283 
 
 unmindful of the claims of his family. Three of his 
 sons have had lucrative appointments. There is a son- 
 in-law a resident magistrate, and I gave not long ago 
 another resident magistracy to the son-in-law of Mrs. 
 Fitz-Simon. I shall be very glad if the time comes for 
 
 my being of service to young Mr. ; it cannot be 
 
 just yet, and I must respectfully decline to receive 
 further rebukes on the subject. 
 
 " Always very faithfully yours, 
 
 " CARLISLE." 
 
 " MY LORD, I beg to thank you for your candid 
 " letter of the 26th inst. But your Excellency labours 
 " under a misapprehension in supposing for a moment 
 " that I had presumed to express any sentiment even 
 " approaching a rebuke. I may have written strongly, 
 " as I felt, but certainly no such thought ever crossed 
 " my mind that your Excellency was in any way 
 " accountable for a policy which I, in common with 
 " every Irish Catholic who sustains the present Govern - 
 " ment, must deplore. If any word in my previous 
 " letter could, even by a forced construction, be sup- 
 " posed to attribute to your Excellency any cause 
 " inconsistent with all that could dignify a Chief 
 " Governor, and with your well-known beneficial 
 " administration in Ireland, all I shall say is, that so 
 " grave an error must be placed to the faultiness of my 
 " language, certainly not to any want of the highest 
 " respect and veneration for your Excellency, which
 
 284 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " would be a gross ingratitude after the several marks 
 " of kindness conferred upon 
 
 " Your Excellency's obliged, 
 
 . " C. BlANCONI. 
 
 " To the Right Hon. The Earl Carlisle, Dublin Castle." 
 
 " DUBLIN CASTLB, 2nd March, 1864. 
 
 " MY DEAR MR. BIANCONI, I cannot regret having 
 used the word rebuke, as it has brought to me such a 
 pleasant letter of disavowal from you. 
 
 " Very faithfully yours, 
 
 " CARLISLE." 
 
 I must not forget to mention that the justiceship of 
 the peace had been conferred on my father unsolicited 
 by himself. His neighbours paid him the great com- 
 pliment of privately memorialising the Lord- Lieutenant 
 of the county. 
 
 There was a movement set on foot by the State, and 
 most heartily helped on by our Church, in which my 
 father took an active part. It Jbegan with the Reform- 
 atories, and embraced model farms, orphanages, and 
 industrial schools. Mr. Lentaigne's enthusiasm did 
 much to assist this movement. My father gave his 
 time and money; he bought in an old brewery in 
 Monaghan, and sold it without profit to the nuns who 
 were to work the reformatory. He exhibited at his 
 own cost his Raphael tapestries for another female 
 reformatory. 
 
 When long past eighty, when he got to be stout,
 
 DEALINGS WITH CHURCH AND STATE. 285 
 
 lame, and helpless, lie would visit the boys' Keformatory 
 in the Wicklow Mountains, at Glancree, and he risked 
 breaking his neck on the scaffolding of the new build- 
 ings at Artane, near Dublin. But then this last was 
 an undertaking of the Christian Brothers. 
 
 The last time he spoke in public was when he en- 
 deavoured to get the grand jury to vote an additional 
 subsidy to the Cashel Female Industrial School. 
 
 There was hardly a convent which did not get some- 
 thing from him. He was the devoted friend of the Sisters 
 of Charity, though he would drive hard bargains about 
 the payment of Bian orphans in the training schools. 
 Every Catholic charity tried to get him on to its board, 
 and was only too glad when he left it, for he was too 
 much used to his own way to work well with others. 
 When the Children's Hospital was founded in Dublin 
 he took the keenest interest in it, and. besides pounds, 
 shillings, and pence, he gave them his pet musical- 
 box. This was his last and favourite charity, always 
 excepting old maids and the Christian Brothers.
 
 CHAPTER XIH. 
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 
 
 I HAD filled some three or four MS. books with all the 
 loving reminiscences of nearly thirty years before I 
 learned that proportion was an important part in the 
 science of book-writing. I have since cast aside a 
 great deal of what I had written, and now I will only 
 attempt to complete my rough sketehes of my father's 
 home life. 
 
 As I have already said, I was the third and last 
 child of my parents, born in September, 1840, long 
 after my brother and sister. I was my father's pet 
 and plaything, and the darling of his old age. The tie 
 between us was very close and tender, a sort of com- 
 radeship one does not often see between father and 
 daughter. I was a delicate child, so I was not sent to 
 school ; and, thank God, I never had a governess. I 
 got my early teaching from my mother and from my 
 lovely and gentle sister. My father was never at home 
 for more than a week at a time, and when he was with 
 us his business was all-pervading. Way-bills and ac- 
 count-books strayed into every corner of the house. His
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 287 
 
 bed-room was full of them, and in spite of my mother's 
 threats, they could not be kept out of the drawing- 
 room. When he wrote, he wrote very fast and generally 
 very illegibly. He was always in a hurry, except when 
 at table. He ate his breakfast leisurely and heartily, 
 chatting the while, and enjoying himself; but when 
 the meal was over he would rush out and not return 
 until dinner-time. During the day he was in a per- 
 petual state of either mental or bodily excitement, 
 doing at least half-a-dozen things at once. In the 
 evening he would play long whist or backgammon, and 
 generally go to bed by ten o'clock. 
 
 When he was at home he would ride with me, but I was 
 made go where he wanted and at the hour he wanted. 
 I was also sometimes under the necessity of being 
 obliged to get into my riding habit in five minutes' time, 
 or I was occasionally when ready kept waiting half 
 an hour. 
 
 As I grew up I used to have to act as his private 
 secretary whenever we were away from home ; and he 
 much preferred my reading his newspaper to him than 
 reading it himself. He was fond of children and loved 
 to see them playing about him. When I was a little 
 thing I used to ride upon his back, and I was very 
 imperious in demanding all the fourpenny fines my 
 mother imposed upon him every time he said " By 
 Gor ! " or " By the Hoky ! " As I was born in 1840 he 
 must have been close upon sixty years of age when I 
 first remember him ; he was then a hale and hearty man 
 with a florid complexion, his hair was turning grey, and
 
 288 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 he was in a measure losing his foreign look and gradually 
 assuming the look of the British ratepayer. He used to 
 talk to me about whatever was uppermost in his mind. 
 " Dan " was the hero of my childhood, though I 
 cannot ever recollect having seen him ; and I shall 
 never forget how my father cried when he heard of his 
 death, and how bitterly he said, " They broke Dan's 
 heart," meaning the young Irish enthusiasts. In 
 spite of the advice of his old friend the Liberator, never 
 to send a daughter away from her mother's side, my 
 sister did go to school ; she was sent to Sion Hill, 
 then a small convent of Dominican nuns near Dublin. 
 It was almost like being at home, the Prioress was a 
 pleasant bright-hearted woman, full of common sense, 
 and my sister was very happy there. 
 
 Kate, for that was her name, was a perfect specimen 
 of an Irish girl. She was of middle size and had a 
 well-proportioned figure. Her eyes were large and 
 violet in colour, her eyebrows, eyelashes, and her hair 
 were nearly black, and her complexion was of that 
 peculiar clearness rarely seen except in Irish women. 
 She had a broad and intellectual forehead, her nose was 
 straight and more delicately cut about the nostril than 
 is common in our country. She had my father's well- 
 cut lips, and had the same light in the eye. She was 
 cheerful in her temper, very firm and steadfast, yet she 
 was very gentle from her perfect self-control. I think 
 she was beloved by every one who knew her. I know 
 that I loved her with that passionate idolatry which 
 children sometimes have for beautiful women who are
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 289 
 
 both tender and true. The twelve years' difference in 
 our ages, together with her grave and earnest nature, 
 made the love between us more like the love of parent 
 and child than of two sisters. Fond and proud of his 
 eldest daughter as my father was, I don't think that 
 he quite understood her ; the hundred queer little 
 dodges and odd twists innate in him, and of which he 
 could not divest himself, while they amused me used 
 to irritate and annoy her. There was so much to be 
 proud of in my father his success, his energy, his 
 sterling goodness, and his liberal acts that it seemed 
 to be a pity that he was so often thinking of some little 
 cunning device, and that he lacked those finer qualities 
 which, had he possessed them, would likely enough 
 have marred his career. 
 
 No one could tell why he never brought up my 
 brother to any profession. My brother was handsome, 
 and very foreign- looking, but for his blue eyes. He had 
 the peculiar aquiline cast of feature that one seldom sees 
 except in Italy. He was foreign in his ways and notions, 
 and he had the aptitude for easily suiting himself to 
 the manners of strangers. He was a fine horseman 
 and a capital whip, but in other respects he was not 
 much like an Irishman. My father kept the quick, 
 intelligent boy at home until he was quite spoiled ; he 
 then sent him to school, but not to the sort of school to 
 which a boy of his parts and station ought to have 
 gone. Though he had a taste for farming and for 
 my father's business, my father was at no pains to in- 
 struct him in either. I have seen and heard poor Dan
 
 CHARLES BIAIfCONI. 
 
 Hearn implore him to bring up my brother to take an 
 interest in the establishment, but instead my father gave 
 him horses to ride and a very irregular allowance of 
 pocket-money. Since my father's death I have found 
 my brother's letters to him, full of eager but somewhat 
 absurd plans, and copies of my father's answers full of 
 platitudes and wise-saws. What my father's ideas were 
 in all this I am totally at a loss to conceive, and in 
 trying to account for it I can only think that if his own 
 boyhood had been happier he would have known better 
 how to educate his son. I hope I am not undutiful 
 in what I have just said, but, as I began this book 
 with the idea of telling the truth, I must not now be 
 turned from my purpose. 
 
 Anything approaching to authorship was so foreign 
 to my father's ordinary avocations that -he regarded 
 his successful Social Science Paper, read at the British 
 Association, with as fond a pride as any author does his 
 first three-volume novel. He sent copies of it right 
 and left to his friends, and amongst others to the 
 charming and naughty Lady Blessington. He had 
 known her as a child when she used to trip past his shop 
 in Clonmel on her way to school, and she always showed 
 great kindness to her old townsfolk. I will give her 
 letter of acknowledgment. Unfortunately it bears no 
 date. 
 
 " DEAR SIR, Accept my best thanks for the statis- 
 tical statement you have sent me. I have perused it 
 with warm interest, and feel, as all must who have read
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 291 
 
 it, that my native land has found in you her best 
 benefactor. I thank you for discovering those noble 
 qualities in my poor countrymen which neglect and 
 injustice may have concealed but have not been able 
 to destroy. While bettering their condition you have 
 elevated the moral character of those you employ ; you 
 have advanced civilisation while inculcating a practical 
 code of morality that must ever prove the surest path 
 to lead to an amelioration of Ireland. Wisdom and 
 humanity, which ought ever to be inseparable, shine 
 most luminously in the plan you have pursued, and its 
 results must win for 'you the esteem, gratitude, and 
 respect of all who love Ireland. The Irish are not an 
 ungrateful people, as they have been too often repre- 
 sented. My own feelings satisfy me on this point. 
 Six of the happiest years of my life have been spent in 
 your country, where I learned to appreciate the high 
 qualities of its natives, and consequently I am not sur- 
 prised, though delighted, to find an Italian conferring 
 so many benefits on mine. When you next come to 
 England it will give me great pleasure to see you, and 
 to assure you in person how truly I am, 
 " Dear sir, your obliged, 
 
 "MARGT. BLESSINGTON. 
 
 " To Charles Bianconi, Eaq." 
 
 My first actual recollection of my father was 
 being held up to see him on the bench when he was 
 Mayor of Clonmel. Then I remember going from 
 Silverspring, my first home, to Longfield, and getting
 
 292 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 there on my sixth birthday. The terrible famine was 
 then just beginning to set in, though we could not 
 then realise all the misery that was to come. I know 
 that it cast a fearful shadow over all my childhood. I 
 heard of nothing and saw nothing but abject distress on 
 every side of me. It seems to me that I can now recall 
 to mind the horrible sickly smell in the fields of 
 rotten potatoes, and that I can see the crows staggering 
 from hunger. I can fancy that I still see the blank 
 look of hopeless despair on the faces of the poor people ; 
 in many of them disease and wretchedness had engen- 
 dered jaundice and dropsy. 
 
 I have already told how my father did what he could 
 to relieve the sufferings of the poor. My dear sister 
 also, on her side, was not less energetic. Her name is 
 still lovingly remembered by some, and more perhaps 
 because of her little ^kind acts of thoughtfulness than 
 because of the actual money that she gave. 
 
 While the famine was slowly closing over the land 
 disaffection was spreading. The brilliant band of 
 young rhetoricians who wrote such noble rebellious 
 lyrics, and came to grief in the Ballingarry cabbage- 
 garden in 1848, were brewing their eloquent mischief. 
 I remember how indignant my father used to be with 
 many of his friends, the younger priests and the neigh- 
 bours generally, who were carried away by this ill- 
 directed enthusiasm. 
 
 About this time, when the famine was wearing itself 
 away, my sister caught a severe cold which fell upon 
 her lungs. She got well enough to go about and
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 293 
 
 pursue her ordinary avocations, but the mischief had 
 planted itself ; consumption set in, from which she never 
 recovered. I rather fancy, too, when she knew that 
 consumption had taken hold of her, she gave herself up, 
 as though she knew she was doomed to die an early 
 death. My father, on the contrary, could not believe 
 that she was dangerously ill, but when he became 
 convinced of his daughter's state he took her to 
 Italy. This was in October 1851, too late to do 
 any good. Had we gone away the winter previous 
 it is perhaps possible that the malady might have been 
 arrested. 
 
 This going abroad was a great annoyance to my 
 father. His car business had to be constantly attended 
 to, he was eager about buying land, and he had to 
 leave his house and home for an indefinitely long time, 
 where he took such delight in seeing his tenants and 
 watching how they prospered. For three years he lived 
 a divided sort of life, his thoughts alternating between 
 his daughter who was dying slowly but surely, and his 
 business at home that could not be wholly neglected. 
 As to poor Kate, at first he hoped and trusted when 
 hope was no longer possible, and at length he suffered 
 himself to be convinced of the mournful truth. 
 
 I propose now to say something shortly about our 
 stay in Italy, and to give extracts from a few of my 
 father's letters. They were written mostly to his 
 private secretary, Mr. O'Leary, a kind-hearted and 
 learned old gentleman, the only scholar and well-read 
 man in his establishment. And these letters may be
 
 294 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 considered as supplementary to those already given in 
 the chapter on the Bians. The Rev. Dr. Leahy alluded 
 to was, as the reader will perhaps remember, then the 
 President of the Thurles Clerical College, and afterwards 
 Archbishop of Cashel. He was a frequent correspond- 
 ent of my father's, and the two men had been fellow- 
 workers in the founding of the Catholic University of 
 which I have already spoken. The prelate had also 
 availed himself of my father's knowledge of business in 
 investing certain moneys for the benefit of the nuns. 
 
 On the 4th December 1851, my father writes to Mr. 
 O'Leary from Rome. He briefly notices our arrival, 
 with a little characteristic bit about his banking account 
 in the middle of the letter. 
 
 , 20th Nov., 1851. 
 
 " We arrived here on the evening of the 12th, and 
 " I received Mr. Hearn's letter of the 30th on the 
 " 13th, and yours of the same date, which followed 
 " me through France, I only received on the 18th, and 
 " yesterday I got yours of the 7th. All were very 
 " satisfactory and interesting letters, for which accept 
 " my thanks. I see Mr. Gill is still keeping my account 
 " open, though I requested it should be closed, and the 
 " balance charged to Mr. Hearn's account. Tell our 
 " friend the Rev. Father Kirwan, and the rest of you, 
 " that we get on famously, all things considered, but 
 " that we have, as yet, very bad weather. I am sorry 
 " I did not bring Miss B. here before. She bore the 
 "journey well, but for the last week was greatly
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 295 
 
 " fatigued. She is beginning to feel well now, and if 
 " the weather was once fine she would come all 
 " right. 
 
 " In my former reflections on the grandeur of this 
 " place I often conceived great ideas of its splendour, 
 " but all of which can bear no comparison to its reality. 
 " And the same may be said of its modern churches 
 " and collections of the fine arts, but on which I have 
 " not yet been able to luxuriate, having been so bewil- 
 " dered at its extent from every quarter, but hope soon 
 " to indulge in a few days' enjoyment. 
 
 " My people are as well as possible with the excep- 
 " tion of Miss B., who was very much fatigued after the 
 "journey, and is only now recovering its effects. I 
 " regret we did not come here sooner, as it would be 
 " impossible to describe the fine air when the weather 
 " is fine, and which is bringing her to very much. I 
 " trust with care and the goodness of Providence we 
 " shall be soon all right. 
 
 " I mentioned in my last a request that you would 
 " see the Rev. Dr. Leahy and send me lots of news from 
 " him. Is Father John dead ? What about him and 
 " the county ? Pay Jerry Lalor his bill. Tell Dr. 
 " Leahy we have a schoolfellow of his (Rev. Dr. Brown 
 " of Cork), who came here for the benefit of his health, 
 " and that I appointed him my honorary chaplain, by 
 " which I introduced 'him to two of the Cardinals and 
 " to the Pope. He is the greatest comfort to us all, 
 " particularly to Charles, who is much improved since. 
 " My people are out driving every day. I am now
 
 296 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " writing in the sun, and you would think it was the 
 " month of April. With usual best regards, 
 
 " Yours very truly, 
 
 " C. BIANCONI." 
 
 My father thus records his impressions of his Holi- 
 ness to that faithful son of the Church, Mr. O'Leary : 
 
 " Your fears about his Holiness are all unfounded. 
 " I saw him yesterday, and no man could look better. 
 " He is as fine a person as you could wish to see, 
 " tall and straight, and much handsomer than me (sic). 
 " Kate's ill-health prevented our being presented to 
 " him up to this, but I hope soon we shall be enabled 
 " to do so." 
 
 I will now give a letter from Kate to Mr. O'Leary. 
 It will sufficiently explain itself. 
 
 " 9th January, 1852. 
 
 " MY DEAR SIR, I am very much obliged to you 
 for the kind interest you have taken in us, and for your 
 solicitude for my recovery. I must ask you to distri- 
 bute the very large sum of money that you got for 
 my cow as follows : Give 6 to Mr. Murphy to buy 
 another cow, the best he can for that price ; 3 to be 
 put to papa's account, and the rest as under. Nurse, 
 30s. ; Denis Dwyer, 5s. ; Jack McGrath, 5s. ; Mary 
 Colgan, 5s. ; John Doyle, 5s. ; Widow Heffernan, 5s. ; 
 Jem Sweetman, of Clonmel, 5s. ; Widow Coonane, 
 2s. Qd. ; Lucy Dwyer, 2s. 6d. ; Widow Curwan, 2s. Qd. ;
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 297 
 
 Tom Bourke, 2s. 6d. ; "William Sweetman, 2s. 6d. ; 
 Judy Dwyer, 2s. 6d. ; Ned Gibbons, 2s. 6d. ; Coman 
 Boherlahan, 2s. 6d. 
 
 " Yesterday I had the pleasure of seeing his Holiness 
 quite unexpectedly. "We were returning towards the city 
 after taking a drive up the Albano Road ; the coach- 
 man stopped and said * here is the Pope,' so Charlie 
 and the servant knelt down ; we remained in the car- 
 riage, and when the Pope came close to us he gave us his 
 blessing. He looks older than his busts represent him, 
 but has a more amiable expression. He was dressed in 
 white with scarlet shoes and hat. He was attended by 
 two monsignores, who walked one at each side of him, 
 and one of the Noble Guard. Several servants walked 
 before him, then came six of the guard mounted, then 
 his carriage, and afterwards that of his suite. I am 
 sorry I cannot describe any of the wonders of the 
 Eternal City ; though I am pretty well, and out driving 
 nearly every day, I am not allowed either to go to mass 
 or to go sight-seeing. Remember me to Father Kirwan, 
 and tell him he is a very good correspondent. Tell any of 
 the people that ask for me that I hope they are going 
 on well, and that the children attend school regularly. 
 When papa goes back remind him of flooring the Ard- 
 mayle School. How is poor Father Mackey? The 
 weather here, with the exception of a bad day in about 
 every fortnight, and occasional cold winds, is delight- 
 ful. 
 
 " Please see that Tippoo is well fed, and that Minnie's 
 kitten gets her milk often. Denis Dwyer is to see if
 
 298 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 her sheep has two lambs this year as she had last, and 
 when the yearlings are sold he is to let her know. 
 " Wishing you many happy returns of the season, 
 " Your obliged, 
 
 " C. H. BlANCONI." 
 
 To me it is very touching to find the tender-hearted 
 elder sister begging the kind old gentleman to see that 
 my pets were attended to. Tippoo was the great watch- 
 dog, but the kitten was mine, and for whose welfare I 
 was often sorely troubled in mind. Far away, and 
 knowing she would never more set foot among her 
 poor, my sister's care for them never slackened ; her 
 memory is yet warm in their hearts. 
 
 My father in a letter to Mr. O'Leary thus speaks of 
 the Jumpers : 
 
 " Many thanks for the news you sent me, which con- 
 " tinue to do. Your last letter stating that the Jumpers 
 " hopped back to the old Mother Church has been in great 
 " request here, for I read it first to one of the cardinals. 
 " It subsequently, I believe, made its way to the Holy 
 " Father, to whom we shall be immediately presented. 
 " I have not had any correspondence from any of my 
 " colleagues of the Catholic University. Will you 
 " therefore run across to my friend, the Most Rev. Dr. 
 " Leahy, and tell him both myself and his old friend 
 " the Rev. Dr. Brown, one of the administrators of 
 " Cork, who is here with us, would be most obliged for
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 299 
 
 " all the news he can give us, and to whom remember 
 " us, and to all our friends. 
 
 " Be sure at your next congress, which you ought to 
 " have at least three times a month, that you enforce 
 " strict discipline, and that you apply this in all 
 " quarters." 
 
 I cannot find any letter describing the interview 
 with his Holiness, but I find some mention of my 
 brother's appointment as one of the Chamberlains at 
 the Papal Court, which was conferred in a very flatter- 
 ing manner. 
 
 " Charles is very busy getting his ' duds ' ready for 
 " office. Enclosed I hand you a copy of his every-day 
 " dress on duty. The state dress is most gorgeous, and 
 " similar to the coat worn by a colonel in the British 
 " army. I hope he will do honour to the great com- 
 " pliment paid his father in the matter. Let your 
 " next letter be to me, Post Office, Milan, as I have 
 " hopes I will be soon on my way to the old country. 
 
 " "Write to Dr. Leahy and say how much I regret his 
 " laziness, as he will not comply with my request of 
 " answering my letters, and that I am very anxious to 
 " hear from him." 
 
 I suspect my father's excessive anxiety to hear from 
 Dr. Leahy arose from a desire to know how the Catholic 
 University was going on. He and the late Mr. Erring- 
 ton were auditors for a time, and my father had no
 
 300 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 faith in the financing of the holy 'people. He would 
 have liked to keep as large a lay element as possible 
 in the working of the institution. In that, however, 
 he hardly showed his usual sagacity, for as yet we 
 have not a sufficiently powerful and intelligent Irish 
 Catholic lay body to be able to work our institutions. 
 
 " It grieves me to learn the failure of the potatoes, 
 " but I hope that the intense heat has only withered 
 " the stalks. If the potatoes intended for the work- 
 " men have suffered, sell them off for my account as 
 " fast as you can at lowest market price, and stop from 
 " each man 2s. weekly till they are paid for. Be sure 
 " in any dealing with them that there is nothing 
 " collateral, or that there be any cause of complaint, 
 " but that in bargains all parties must be bound, not 
 " for its value so much as its principle. 
 
 " Referring to mine respecting the three-acre field to 
 " be turned up, I am most anxious to have it so, but in 
 " addition, wish Mr. Murphy to have it drained at 
 " 24 feet apart and 3 feet deep before it is dug up, and 
 " this will absorb all our labour, and make those that 
 " will not stand the screw of contract work look for em- 
 " ployment elsewhere. Be sure that all our staff is put on 
 " this work, and by contract, and as soon as may be. . . 
 
 "By all means give Judy Dwyer any crops that 
 " her good mother may have in the ground, for the 
 " old woman was a great pet with us all, and Miss 
 " Kate has had some masses said for her repose. Pay 
 " Miss Hearn's pension until further orders, which send
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS 'OF MY FATHER. 301 
 
 " on receipt regularly by an order on Mr. Taylor, and 
 " do not forget Father Mackey's dues. Send an order 
 " on O'Loughlin to Father Crotty for 3 
 
 " You say nothing of late about the tenants. You 
 " ought to see that they settle on the 1st May 1851, 
 " in full, on the principle of the reduced rent, par- 
 " ticularly Wall and Tom Hennessy. I hope you paid 
 " Dr. Cormack 1, having sent for him specially, 
 " and that poor Jack McGrath is attended to 
 
 "Many thanks for your satisfactory letters of the 
 " 26th and 30th inst. Miss Minnie complains that 
 " at your Christmas distribution you forgot her chil- 
 " dren (Jack Bourke and family). Mrs. B. says that 
 " you forgot Coman, Gibbins, and Slattery the shep- 
 " herd, who was better entitled to your consideration 
 " than Paddy Morrissey, who is a respectable tradesman, 
 " and ought not to have taken it from you 
 
 " By all means in all matters of discipline represent 
 
 " me in the severest terms of punishment, and in H 's 
 
 " case you must be of my own feelings. You cannot 
 " be too severe with that dunghill. . . . 
 
 " Make Denis Dwyer go regularly among the tenants 
 
 "to see that they don't trick us, for , both last 
 
 " year and the year before, sold all his wheat and put 
 " the money into his pocket, and made us take the 
 " rubbish in lieu thereof. You are aware I am taking 
 " 12s. in the 1. I see no reason why they should not 
 " do their duty to us as we do ours to them, particularly 
 
 " Mr. , if he is thrashing. He must pay los. per 
 
 " acre for the large field with its appurtenances next to
 
 302 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 " the chapel, and 12s. in the 1 for the factory lot, 
 " and he can have the use of the factory for a barn. 
 " Kendrick paid you before he thrashed. McMahon 
 " may be able to pay us [5 for the horse. Wall and 
 " Hennessy not to be scheming. Myers paid me no 
 " rent last year. Phil Maher pays 3 annually interest 
 " on the money expended in draining his farm. I hope 
 " Mr. Murphy has arranged with Slattery for the 
 " watching of the crops, as it would be ridiculous to 
 " lose a man as heretofore about them. Write to me 
 " to this place. I am glad your sisters are so happy at 
 " the retreat. I hope the covered car has come to 
 
 "you 
 
 " With reference to the tenants, let Denis Dwyer go 
 " amongst them and see what they are doing, and see 
 " if they are thrashing of their own accord. Of course 
 " we shall expect them to give us the oats at Cashel 
 " prices. With regard to John Walsh's Castlefield lot, 
 " which he held under agreement at 2 per acre, and 
 "as he had the use and benefit of it, I see no reason 
 " why the rent may not be paid ; but don't insist on it 
 " at present. I hope you have settled fully with Wall 
 " and Hennessy, and that there will be no excuse 
 " about their doing the needful for the past and present. 
 " I was sorry to find Kendrick thrashing and selling 
 " his corn behind our backs. What's the meaning of 
 " this ? McMahon must do the needful this year." 
 
 We arrived in Rome early in November 1851 ; and 
 after we had been there some weeks my father endea-
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 303 
 
 voured to see his Holiness. He had procured some very 
 favourable introductions from the leading Irish bishops 
 with whom he had been associated in the founding of 
 the Catholic University, and the Holy Father was suffi- 
 ciently informed about this successful and devoted son 
 of the Church to receive him with special kindness. 
 He was good enough to make inquiries as to the 
 state of Ireland, and to speak in flattering terms of 
 how our people had kept their faith all through the 
 years of the famine. My father solicited that his 
 Holiness would take my brother into his service, a 
 request which was graciously complied with, and my 
 brother was forthwith appointed one of the gentlemen- 
 in-waiting. 
 
 The duties consisted merely of waiting in attendance 
 at certain times in the year. 
 
 The Italians hate the smell of all perfumes I wish 
 we in England and Ireland were only more like them 
 in this respect and one day my brother went on duty 
 after using some very fragrant hair-oil. His Holiness 
 plainly showed his dislike to the nasty smell by ad- 
 ministering a rebuke to my brother " Che puzzo ! " 
 " What a stench ! " but was otherwise good-natured, as 
 he was about everything else. We often used to see 
 him walking briskly along the country roads with a 
 few attendants, his carriage and his guards being a little 
 way behind. No homely priest in Ireland could have 
 acknowledged a peasant's greeting with more simple 
 courtesy than the Pope was in the habit of showing to 
 those who saluted him.
 
 304 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 My 'father's vanity was tickled by being made 
 much of in high places, and being well received 
 wherever he went. I rather expect he once disturbed 
 the equanimity of some important personages by in- 
 sisting upon bringing a few bottles of whisky to a 
 dinner where he had been invited, and in brewing some 
 punch after the repast. He persuaded a most amiable 
 professor to drink a couple of stiff tumblers of his 
 mixture, and this good-natured but unfortunate gentle- 
 man never met my father afterwards but what he said 
 the foul fiend was in the beverage. My father always 
 said that the Monsignori and the high clergy in Rome 
 had a capital notion ~of a rubber of whist. He would 
 often sit down with them and play rubber after rubber, 
 all for honour and glory ; they allowed themselves the 
 use of cards, but gambling was forbidden. 
 
 Some time before we left Ireland a subscription had 
 been set on foot in our neighbourhood for a monument 
 over O'Ccnnell's heart ; but the people were so badly 
 off and money dribbled in so sparingly that my father 
 begged the subscription might be stopped and that he 
 would erect the monument at his own cost. After 
 we had been in Rome a few days he took me with 
 him to St. Agatha the church of the Irish College 
 where O'Connell's heart was kept in a silver urn in 
 one of the vaults. It seemed a pity that Hogan, the 
 eminent Irish sculptor, could not execute the monument ; 
 but instead he sent my father to Benzoni, to whom the 
 work was entrusted. There was a great discussion 
 about what inscription was to be on the monument.
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 305 
 
 My father, according to his custom, consulted many 
 people about it, and also, according to his habit, he 
 had his own way in the end. The inscription ran as 
 follows : 
 
 This Monument contains the Heart of 
 O'CONNELL, 
 
 Who, dying on his way to the Eternal City, hequeathed 
 
 his Soul to God, his Body to Ireland, 
 
 and his Heart to Rome. 
 
 He is represented at the Bar of the British House of Commons, 
 1829, 
 
 When he refused to take the anti-Catholic declaration 
 
 in these remarkable words : 
 
 " I at once reject this declaration : part of it I believe to be untrue, 
 and the rest I know to be false." 
 
 He was born 6th August, 1776 ; died loth May, 1847. 
 
 Erected by CHARLES BIAXCOXI, Esq., the faithful 
 
 Friend of the Immortal Liberator, 
 and of Ireland, the land of his adoption. 
 
 The monument consists of an entablature representing 
 O'Connell at the Bar of the House of Commons, and a 
 beautiful alto-relievo, a weeping Erin holding in her 
 arms the urn with O'ConnelTs heart, and raising her 
 head to an angel pointing upwards. My father took 
 great pains to secure accurate likenesses of the states- 
 men on each side of the central figure, and he brought 
 over several books of prints containing portraits of 
 well-known political characters for this purpose. Going 
 frequently to Benzoni's studio gave him some pleasant 
 occupation, and Benzoni made for him a very fine bust
 
 306 CHAELES BIAXCOXI. 
 
 of my sister as a Madonna. It was unfortunately lost 
 at sea. 
 
 The two winters we spent in Rome showed me a 
 new phase of my father's existence. He who never 
 had a moment's spare time at home would take me 
 through the galleries and the studios ; he would walk 
 with me, and I would have long and pleasant rides with 
 him through the wide Campagna, and he was very 
 proud of the notice my childish figure and yellow curls 
 attracted as I was perched up on a great big horse. 
 Every day drew us nearer and nearer to each other, 
 and from this time I date my passionate love for 
 pictures. Rome at that time was full of university 
 men who had come over to our Church, and now for 
 the first time I saw my father in intimate contact with 
 men of thought. He enjoyed their society very much, 
 though he himself used to say that " thinking was not 
 much in his line." One of these English friends 
 accompanied him on a ride to Tivoli, and on their way 
 back my father stopped to examine a shepherd as to 
 his mode of life, and he expressed much wonder because 
 the peasant only put on clean linen once a- week ; but 
 the shepherd refused point-blank to believe that my 
 father could be so wasteful as to want a clean shirt 
 every day. 
 
 My father's hopes of bringing Kate home again in 
 the summer were not realised. However, she rallied 
 sufficiently to be able to have two pleasures upon which 
 she had long set her heart. The one was to see the 
 Pope, and the other was to see the picture gallery
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 307 
 
 in the Vatican. From Rome we went to La Cava, near 
 Naples. My father and my brother went up Vesuvius 
 together, and they also went to Paestum and to Amalfi. 
 My brother came of age at La Cava in October, and 
 after this my father returned to Ireland, leaving my 
 brother to escort us back to Rome. 
 
 We stopped a night in the Pontine Marshes, and 
 there we all, except Kate, caught the fever. It showed 
 itself just as we had settled down in Rome. Kate sat 
 up and nursed us, and though my mother was in great 
 danger, Kate kept her presence of mind wonderfully. 
 At this time also news came to us from home that my 
 father was ill in Ireland. My parents both recovered ; 
 it was their darling girl who was so soon to be taken 
 from them. "When the fever left us her strength began 
 to fail her, and her health slowly but surely got to be 
 worse and worse. 
 
 That summer we wandered about for a few weeks 
 and then settled down for a time on the lake of Como. 
 We went to Venice, where we stayed for some time ; 
 the quaint old town pleased us all very much. It was 
 one evening in Venice that I saw a something in Kate's 
 face which even to this day occasionally haunts me. 
 There seemed to be a look in her eyes expressive of a 
 distant though blissful rest, which, though child as I 
 was, quite frightened me. I had only seen this by an 
 accidental glance ; I turned to my father, and I per- 
 ceived that he also had noticed Kate's face. I used 
 often to see him watching her when he thought she was 
 unaware of it. It is likely enough, indeed, that the poor
 
 308 CHARLES BIANCOXI. 
 
 girl, who knew her state, was quite conscious of her 
 father's anxiety for her. 
 
 From Venice we went to Milan, where my father 
 met some of his relations. There was a cousin of his, a 
 learned old advocate who was then writing a treatise on 
 jurisprudence ; and there was also my aunt Barbara, of 
 whom my father was very fond. She was like him, but 
 she was handsomer, and I think she had a more frank 
 and open look about the eyes. I became very fond of her ; 
 she used to talk to me in good Italian, but my father and 
 she would chatter together in their uncouth Milanese 
 patois, that I could barely understand. She had long 
 been a widow ; her husband had* left her tolerably well 
 off, she wanted nothing for herself, but she was very 
 grateful when her rich, good-natured brother came 
 forward to help her in the education of her widowed 
 daughter's children. 
 
 From Milan we went to Pisa for the winter. Kate's 
 appearance was not worse than it latterly had been, and 
 my father still hoped, though hope was no longer pos- 
 sible. I think he had a feeling, though he did not 
 avow it, that God, who had hitherto been so good to 
 him, would not now inflict the threatened blow. Kate 
 knew that her end was coming, she faced the slow but 
 certain death with the most calm and perfect courage. 
 She spoke cheerfully, and with her mind untroubled as 
 to her future state. She wrote down on a few pieces of 
 paper what was practically her will ; and I well recollect 
 how my father cried and how he kissed her as he took 
 the papers from his daughter. Why should I dwell on
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 309 
 
 these painful recollections ? Kate lingered on for some 
 months, and died in Pisa on the 27th May, 1854. Her 
 body was brought home and was buried in the little 
 mortuary chapel at Longfield. 
 
 After Kate's death we spent two more winters in 
 Pisa, and came to be on very intimate terms with some 
 of the leading Pisan families. My father felt and 
 showed an unusual regard for a lovely and very gentle 
 widowed lady, who in these times was very kind to my 
 mother, and whose companionship afforded her much 
 comfort. He professed this respect because she was 
 the dowager duchess of a great Lombard house ; but I 
 think her melancholy tenderness, and the sympathy of 
 a woman who had herself lost many who were near and 
 dear to her, created much of his affection for her. 
 
 Nothing ever made my father so well aware of the 
 blessings of English rule as seeing how the men suf- 
 fered their lives to pass away so listlessly under the 
 most amiable government and with the most humane 
 of all land systems. He used to go a good deal into 
 society, and he was an intimate friend of sundry great 
 ladies, and he would hold forth somewhat magnilo- 
 quently upon the glories and privileges of the British 
 subject, the virtues of juries, petty sessions, workhouse 
 boards, and such-like parts of our constitution. My 
 father, an Italian in Italy, seemed to be twice as good 
 an Irishman there as he was at home. It was plain 
 that a man cannot belong to two countries and call 
 each of them his home. 
 
 It was very melancholy for the old man to see his
 
 310 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 daughter, his son, and his son-in-law all taken away from 
 him during his own lifetime. My brother and my father 
 had sometimes lived together not with that mutual trust 
 and good understanding that there ought to be between 
 father and son. 'And this, I think, was not so much 
 owing to any innate faults of my brother as to the 
 thoroughly bad way in which my father had brought 
 him up. Educated for no profession, and untrained to 
 any business, but left alone to follow pretty much his 
 own way, it is only natural that he became idle and 
 fond of pleasure. My father was truly glad when he 
 married, and the more so because he married a grand- 
 daughter of his old friend Daniel O'Connell. He and 
 his wife were constantly at Longfield, and my father 
 was only too pleased to see them there. My father and 
 my brother were then good friends, and we were all 
 happy and contented. A town house was taken in 
 Dublin, and my father's first grandchild was born 
 there under his roof. He said he was not disappointed 
 that it was a girl. My brother and his wife then went 
 abroad, and while they were away a second daughter 
 was born. Nellie, the eldest child, was sent home, and 
 she always lived with her grandfather. After about 
 three years, my brother, his wife, and little Lily, the 
 second child, came back to Longfield, and there twin 
 daughters were born. One of them has lived to bear 
 her aunt Kate's name. 
 
 When my brother was at home this time he occupied 
 himself with the farm ; he again took to riding, and 
 he spent a good deal of his time in painting. All would
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 311 
 
 have gone on happily but for his bad health, which 
 was unmistakably failing him. He had to go over to 
 England on business ; his wife, who was nursing a baby 
 at the time, went with him, and my father also sent his 
 own servant, James Sweetman, in case of accident. My 
 brother had long been subject to attacks of bleeding ; 
 one of these attacks seized him. at Holyhead, and the 
 poor fellow died there in the middle of his journey, 
 from a bleeding of the head. Thank God, he had time 
 to receive the rites of the Church. Though my brother 
 had been ill before this, we had no reason to suspect 
 such an early and sudden death. 
 
 Before this there had been much talk and many 
 doubts going on at home about my own marriage. My 
 father had long known and liked Morgan John O'Con- 
 nell, and had even tried to get him a rich wife, but he 
 was fairly taken aback when his old friend asked him 
 for his daughter. My father then looked upon the 
 man in an altogether different light. I was then his 
 only child, and my lover was more than twice my age. 
 He had let slip from him all his prospects in life, his 
 father had been ruined in the bad times in Ireland, 
 his own estates were so encumbered that they yielded 
 then only a very moderate income. Such a man was 
 not the suitor that my father wished for his daughter. 
 He could not give a point-blank " no " to the proposal 
 when it was made to him, though I believe he longed to 
 do so ; but instead he set to work to find all the objec- 
 tions that could be raked up against Morgan John 
 O'Connell. Priests and wise men were enjoined to
 
 312 CHARLES BIAXCONI. 
 
 advise me to think no more of the matter. But I 
 remained firm to my pledge; I had given my word, 
 and I was not to be shaken by their unasked-for advice. 
 My father could find nothing against the honour of the 
 would-be son-in-law ; though, indeed, it was not against 
 the honour, but against the worldly prospects of my 
 lover that he was trying to raise objections. We have 
 all heard of the law that prevents the course of true 
 love from running smooth. The law was as strong in 
 my case as it has been in that of other people. But like 
 other people I overcame the law; and then for ten 
 happy years our love did run very smooth indeed. I 
 was only surprised to find what a thoroughly domestic- 
 minded man the once gay member for Kerry turned 
 out to be, how reasonable and how fair-minded towards 
 the weaknesses of others was he who had been so 
 popular and so well-loved in every society, both in 
 England and in Ireland. My husband had all his life 
 in his listless way been a keen student of men and 
 manners, and he explained to me some of the odd points 
 in my father's character which I had never been quite 
 able to see through. The two men soon became tho- 
 roughly fond of each'other, and my father would have 
 liked to have had us always with him at Longfield. 
 Not only during their tumbler of punch after dinner, 
 but while we were playing whist or backgammon in 
 the drawing-room, my husband would poke his fun at 
 him and quiz him in the frankest manner. Many a 
 time when my father wanted to try a little dodge upon 
 a friendly candidate, or to take a petty advantage of a
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 313 
 
 tenant, Morgan would laugh, or would scold him out of 
 it. " Well now, Governor, you're the divil," he would 
 say ; or, " I declare, Governor, you're the greatest play- 
 actor I ever met ; " and my father would raise one 
 eyebrow and smile, and look evidently pleased at the 
 compliment. And he was, I think, very much pleased, 
 not so much perhaps at the words addressed to him, as 
 in the feeling that he had in his own house a son- 
 in-law whom he so perfectly loved and so thoroughly 
 trusted. Had I married a man about my own age, had 
 my father secured for me the ideal son-in-law for whom 
 he was once evidently on the look out, I doubt whether 
 his last years would have been so happy. My father 
 liked a joke, and he liked even being quizzed in a gentle- 
 manly spirit ; and I am sure that few men, Irish or 
 English, have in them so much pleasant banter, such 
 genial humour, so much wit and such powers of conver- 
 sation, as had my late husband. 
 
 For a man close upon fourscore years of age, it was 
 wonderful to see how active both in body and in mind 
 my father was in the year 1865. He still rode Molly, 
 his black Connemara pony, a fine frisky little animal, 
 and able to do as much work as many a good horse. 
 So long as the beast was kept in a trot she was as tame 
 and orderly in her movements as a house cat, but 
 when urged into a canter she would take two steps, put 
 down her head, get the bit between her teeth, and dart 
 off like any mad creature. My father was accustomed 
 to her movements, but very frequently he lost his 
 seat and found himself lying upon the grass. He
 
 314 CHAKES BIAXCONI. 
 
 certainly had learnt the art of knowing how to fall, 
 and he had learnt another art consequent upon that. 
 He used always before going out to ride to put an apple 
 into his pocket, and when Miss Molly had dislodged 
 him from the saddle he would coax her back to him by 
 means of this bait. The cunning animal knew the 
 device as well as possible, and she never failed to 
 swallow it. It was a common saying in the stable that 
 " One day Molly would be the death of her master." 
 My father had perforce to give up riding her on account 
 of an accident very much worse than ever happened to 
 him from a tumble off his favourite pony. 
 
 My friend, and my father's old friend, Mr. Michael 
 Angelo Hayes, has given me an account of it, and I 
 cannot do better than let him relate the unhappy occur- 
 rence. 
 
 "I shall ever remember the 7th of October 1865. 
 On that day Mr. Bianconi met with a severe accident 
 which very nearly proved fatal to him, and from the 
 effects of which he never quite recovered. I had been 
 stopping at Longfield for some days, and on this morn- 
 ing he asked me to accompany him over the grounds, 
 saying that I should ride his favourite little mare, 
 Moll. At the hall door I rather bantered him upon 
 the style of his equipage. The harness was made of 
 old odds and ends, some of the buckles were brass and 
 others were plated. The outside car, too, on which he 
 flrove was a lumbering old vehicle, and he took the 
 same pride in this old car that a wealthy man some- 
 times shows in wearing a threadbare coat. But I did
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 315 
 
 not imagine at the time of starting on our expedition 
 that the old harness would have produced the catastrophe 
 that followed. We had been out for .some hours, we 
 had visited the mortuary chapel every visitor was 
 expected to visit ' the mortuary ' and we had inspected 
 the progress of the glebe-house he was then building 
 for the priest of the parish, and which he intended pre- 
 senting as a gift in perpetuity to all future parish 
 priests, and we then turned back towards Longfield. 
 I rode on expecting he would soon overtake me on the 
 car, but I reached the house and he had not come up 
 with me. I had just dismounted, when a messenger 
 came running up the avenue to say that Mr. Bianconi 
 had met with an accident. I remounted and galloped 
 back along the road as fast as Moll could carry me, 
 and made my way into a roadside cabin surrounded by 
 a crowd. I found my old friend supported on a chair. 
 The moment he saw me he said, * Mike, I am hit.' I 
 saw that his leg was injured, and I asked him to turn 
 his foot if he could ; he did so, but when I asked him 
 to raise his leg he was powerless to do it. Poles were 
 then fastened to the chair, and a kind of platform was 
 made to support his leg, and four men carried him back 
 to Longfield, about half a mile distant. I thought 
 I never saw a sadder procession, as the four men, 
 endeavouring to carry their master as gently and as 
 carefully as they could, moved slowly along, followed 
 by a crowd of silent people. It looked like his last 
 progress up the demesne, for I feared that at his 
 advanced age he could not survive the effects of such
 
 316 CHAELES BIANCONI. 
 
 an accident. Dr. Russell, of Cashel, soon arrived, and 
 he ascertained that the neck of the thigh-bone was 
 broken, a frequent accident late in life, the result of 
 any sudden shock, as the bones become brittle with age, 
 but he gave no hope that it would ever reunite, or 
 that Mr. Bianconi would ever again be able to walk. 
 
 " The old man had borne his misfortune with admir- 
 able resignation and fortitude. He was less excited 
 than those who surrounded him, and he gave his direc- 
 tions while they were moving him with the greatest 
 coolness and self-possession. Had the harness been 
 strong the accident would in all probability not have 
 happened. A strap had suddenly burst, which caused 
 the shaft to rise off the back of the horse, and Mr. 
 Bianconi was thrown violently on to the road. 
 
 " His wonderful constitution carried him through, and 
 after some time he was able to move about in a wheeled 
 chair, and before very long he began to drive about 
 the estate and visit the neighbouring towns in fact, 
 he began to travel about as much as ever. He came 
 frequently to Dublin, always stopping at the Imperial 
 Hotel, where he met his old friends, and where he and 
 I had many a hit of backgammon, a game to which he 
 was very partial. He was at the cattle shows and at 
 all the exhibitions in fact, he was seen everywhere in 
 his bath chair ; but he could not go as of yore to the 
 Castle. Nevertheless, though he could not go to the 
 mountain that is, to the Lord-Lieutenant the moun- 
 tain, in the shape of Lord Carlisle, reversed the legend and 
 came to him. That amiable, accomplished, and deser-
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 317 
 
 vedly popular Viceroy never failed to single out Mr. 
 Bianconi at the Royal Dublin Society's shows, or at the 
 other places of public resort where he happened to be 
 present in his wheeled chair, for they were great 
 friends, and Lord Carlisle esteemed him very highly. 
 
 " Mr. Bianconi all through his life invariably made 
 the best of everything, and he did the same as regarded 
 this accident. He said it was the luckiest thing that 
 ever happened to him, for it obliged him to break up 
 and dispose of his immense establishment of cars and 
 horses and all their belongings. The railways had not 
 diminished his undertakings. As the extension of a 
 railway drove him off one line of road he opened up a 
 new line of car traffic on another, and he put new cars 
 upon the roads in the north and north-west, and upon 
 cross-country roads where hitherto he had not extended 
 his conveyances. He managed to dispose successfully 
 of his entire establishment, dividing it among many, 
 and providing for those in his employment by ad- 
 vancing the purchase-money and taking time for the 
 repayments, thus to the last benefiting others as well as 
 himself. He never liked looking back or indulging in 
 vain regrets, or thinking of what might have been. He 
 always accused me of thinking too much. He said 
 they had a proverb in Italy, ' Thinking is the business 
 of fools.' " 
 
 At first it was hardly expected he would have lived 
 long after his mishap, but by God's grace he remained 
 with us for nearly another ten years. 
 
 There was no fear of immediate death from the
 
 318 CHARLES BIANCOXI. 
 
 accident, but there was great fear of his pining away 
 from the want of air and exercise. Happily, he had 
 singularly sound flesh, and so escaped all dangers of 
 bed-sores and erysipelas. I have found piles of Bian 
 letters of that time stuffed into old pigeon-holes ; some 
 of them give an idea of the panic that spread through 
 his establishment consequent upon his misfortune. 
 
 Good old Dan Hearn, though looking as fine and 
 strong as ever, knew that he himself was doomed to 
 die, for he felt unmistakably the signs of an incurable 
 heart complaint. His fine young son at home was also 
 dying; there was no man who was fitted to take up 
 the large business which was to have been my poor 
 brother's inheritance. After my brother's death my 
 father had willed the establishment, in lieu of other 
 provision, to Dan Hearn ; but it was evident he would 
 never live to enjoy it. He certainly shortened his life 
 by his exertions that winter. In proportion as my 
 father was condemned to physical inaction his mental 
 energy seemed to increase ; he would call in the steward 
 at six o'clock in the morning, and his bed was per- 
 petually strewn with way-bills and newspapers ; his 
 prayer-book and a volume of "Lives of the Saints" 
 were generally to be found there also. 
 
 When my father regained some strength he began to 
 set about getting rid of the establishment ; Dan Hearn 
 had never ceased urging him to do so. My husband had 
 gone to see Hearn a very short time before his death, 
 and Hearn. urged him most strongly to tell my father 
 that his dying request was that he should sell it.
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 319 
 
 Dan Hearn died on the 6th March, 1866. My father 
 was unable to be present at the funeral of his good old 
 friend and most faithful servant, whose whole time, 
 thought and energies had been given up to his ser- 
 vice. 
 
 I do not like to say for certain, as I have now no 
 means of finding out what passed between the dead, 
 but I rather think our old friend Dan Hearn died 
 without the satisfaction of knowing that my father had 
 taken his last advice. Looking through the old papers 
 here I have found two old drafts of wills one made 
 when my brother was just of age, leaving to him the 
 Bians, then a splendid heritage ; another and a later 
 will, in which, as finally fell out, I, his sole living child, 
 was placed in the position of an eldest son as regards 
 the landed property. 
 
 Mr. John Walsh, in his little sketch which I have 
 given in the chapter on the Bians, relates how my 
 father sent for him and Mr. Kennedy O'Brien in March, 
 1867, and sold to them off-hand the western lines. 
 
 As far as it was possible he sold the lines to his own 
 servants, his agents, and his clerks. These men were 
 anxious to buy up the shorter lines, which required a 
 smaller sum to work them. My father only reserved 
 to himself the one-horse car line between Goold's Cross 
 and Cashel that went past his own door, and on the 
 Clonmel and Cashel line he bargained for the right of 
 free carriage of his parcels. 
 
 "We had feared that my father would have felt the 
 loss of his usual occupation, and that he would become
 
 320 CHARLES BIANCONI. 
 
 weary and depressed in spirit; instead of this he soon 
 became nearly as active as ever he had been. He found 
 means of being carried about, he got a wheeled- chair, 
 he was lifted into his brougham, and he even insisted on 
 being driven upon an outside jaunting-car. He resumed 
 his habit of rushing about everywhere, serving upon 
 grand juries, attending petty sessions, going to the 
 Dublin Society's meetings, and at Limerick Junction 
 he was constantly seen being wheeled about upon the 
 same truck as his own portmanteau. When at Dublin 
 he always went to the Imperial Hotel. His friends 
 used to go and see him there, and he did as much busi- 
 ness in one day as any ordinary man would have done 
 in two. He used to say that it was a great convenience 
 getting people to come and see him at his hotel, for he 
 could ask them to come when he liked, and he could 
 send them away when he liked. 
 
 I think he was very happy in his old age. He 
 had done the work of his life to the best of his ability, 
 keeping an eye always to the main chance, but also 
 striving as he prospered to help others in their troubles. 
 
 I have already said how thoroughly my father liked 
 having all his family about him in his own house, for, 
 like most men who can and do work hard, he could also 
 enjoy himself when the time for enjoyment came. We 
 used to dine punctually at six o'clock, after which he 
 would sip his one tumbler of punch not made as the 
 Italian professor in Rome accused him of making it 
 and then he would join us in the drawing-room and 
 play whist or backgammon, and at ten o'clock he
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 321 
 
 would always go to bed. I well remember his joy 
 when my boy was born, I had had a little girl, but 
 she did not live many days, when there was a male 
 heir come into the family. The child was, of course, 
 according to the custom immutable in Ireland, called 
 John, after his father's father ; his second name was 
 Charles, and the old man was evidently pleased at this 
 little compliment paid to him. He kept announcing, 
 however, in an almost solemn manner, that there must 
 be another boy, that he should be called Charles Bian- 
 coni, and that he should be his heir. But no such 
 personage ever arrived. Nothing could have exceeded 
 the old man's affection for his little grandson, whom 
 he would drag about with him all over his farm in 
 the most reckless manner possible, in and out of the 
 dangerous lanes through which only the special mercy 
 of Providence enabled a heavy four-wheeled vehicle 
 to be dragged. A fine old sporting squire has assured 
 me that he never in all his life felt such fear when 
 riding across country as he did in the two hours he was 
 seated in my father's trap. It is true that the horses 
 were stout and strong, the coachman was steady 
 and there was always a rope carried in case of an 
 accident. 
 
 He had the happiness of having his grandchildren 
 about him in his old age, and this I think was a source 
 of comfort to him. My brother's two elder daughters 
 lived then at Longfield, and the little one used to come 
 to him frequently. My husband and I were sometimes 
 with my father, sometimes we were in London, or at 
 
 Y
 
 322 CHARLES BIANCOXI. 
 
 our own little place in county Clare, where he twice came 
 to see us. We went about a good deal, but Longfield 
 was really our home. 
 
 My father, by degrees, got so used to the loss of 
 power in his leg that I do not think he became so 
 depressed in spirits as many another man would have 
 been. He kept four carriage horses constantly at work, 
 for, in spite of his broken leg, he would not, and could 
 not, keep still. Before his accident he was always 
 rushing about upon two-wheeled cars, or upon his 
 pony ; he then used to say that a carriage was too pon- 
 derous, and that it was effeminate. 
 
 Every Saturday morning, summer and winter, he 
 attended the nine-o'clock mass in the mortuary, and 
 confessed and communicated ; and he never seemed any 
 worse for the fasting and the fatigue of the two-mile 
 drive before breakfast. Every Christmas he would join 
 in with us in singing " Adeste Fideles," and he would 
 sometimes wind up with a stanza of " God save the 
 Queen." He was always glad to see people in his 
 house, and to the last his mind was quite clear and 
 firm. 
 
 I will now mention some few of his peculiar tastes. 
 Large-minded and liberal as my father was in all im- 
 portant matters, in trifles he was almost penurious. I 
 have heard him say he would walk a mile to save six- 
 pence ; and this when he was an old man. He was 
 anxious that his garden should be nice, and of having 
 vegetables, fruits, and flowers ; he took care that the 
 place was properly kept up, not for his own sake, for I
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 323 
 
 do not think that he cared much for these things. He 
 saw that my mother and I liked it, and therefore he 
 wished it to be done. Let me say, however, that in 
 this respect, as in many others, my father's tastes were 
 rather contradictory. Flowers generally gave him no 
 feeling of pleasure, but he was very fond of cabbage- 
 roses, clove-pinks, and lavender ; these may have re- 
 called some memories of his youth. And he was also 
 specially fond of thorn blossoms, and of the singing of 
 birds, both of which are unknown in Italy, where the 
 people clip the thorns and eat their feathered songsters. 
 
 My father had a passion for old silver plate, and 
 when he died he left over 1,000 worth behind him. 
 He also spent a good deal of money on diamonds, 
 though my mother had no special wish for them ; he 
 set a great store upon a pair of small diamond ear- 
 rings which had belonged to his mother, and also upon 
 an ivory statuette of Our Lady that had belonged to 
 his uncle the Provost. These and a pair of silver- 
 mounted pistols were the only relics that he ever cared 
 to have from his old home, and they consequently had 
 in his eyes a value far exceeding their intrinsic worth. 
 
 There is one other fancy of my father's that I must 
 mention : his great interest for art. His fine pictures, 
 busts, and tapestries were at the service of every exhi- 
 bition. I find some interesting letters from Smith 
 O'Brien about a bust of Father Mathew by Hogan. 
 Our most distinguished sculptor had got the order for 
 the bas-relief on the Wellington Monument, commemo- 
 rating the Emancipation. He died, leaving the model
 
 324 CHARLES BTANCOXI. 
 
 unfinished. My father, Dr. Madden, and Sir ~W. Wilde 
 never left Lord Carlisle in peace until the commission 
 was given to Hogan's son, who was then studying in 
 Rome. Benzoni superintended the work, thanks to 
 my father. I find he tried very hard to have Thomas 
 Drummond's likeness introduced among the Members 
 of Parliament. This happened just before my father's 
 accident. He was a busy member of the Dublin 
 O'Connell Monument Committee, and was among those 
 who desired that the work should be entrusted to 
 Foley. Long after he was lame, he made me and my 
 husband visit Foley in his studio, where I heard Foley 
 express his own preference for the uncloaked model of 
 the statue. I am perfectly certain that my husband's 
 death alone prevented my father from attending the 
 O'Connell Centenary, though he was then much broken 
 down and very infirm. 
 
 About three years before his death my father got a 
 slight paralytic stroke, which made him rather more un- 
 able to help himself, and which in some measure affected 
 his speech, butit in no wise damped his indomitable 
 energy. To the very end he continued to go about, 
 and at the very time of his death he was engaged in the 
 purchase of land. 
 
 I have now nearly come to the end of my task, but 
 I have to record my husband's death, which took place 
 before my father's, on the 2nd July, 1875. He had had 
 two severe attacks before that time, from which he 
 rallied and seemed to get almost well ; but on St. John's 
 Day he had an apoplectic fit, and from that illness he
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 325 
 
 never recovered. His death was quite painless, he 
 seemed to fall asleep, and died with a smile on his lips. 
 My poor old father was greatly grieved, but, as at 
 his son's death before what seemed to affect him the 
 most was the appearance of his young widow in her 
 weeds, so at my husband's death he cried most when 
 his little grandchild came to him dressed in a black 
 frock. On the day of the funeral my father wished 
 to go to see my husband buried, but we prevailed on 
 him to stay at home. He wheeled his chair close to 
 the window, and watched the coffin as it was carried 
 out and taken down the avenue, followed by a crowd 
 of people. 
 
 I suppose there have been few, if I may be allowed 
 to say it, who were neither rich nor great men, who were 
 more loved than was my late husband. For thirty 
 years past he had not owned an inch of land in Kerry, 
 and yet in Killarney all the shops in the town were 
 shut when the news of his death became known. Both 
 here and in Clare we received every formal mark of 
 sympathy and goodwill. 
 
 After my husband's death I went for a few weeks to 
 our place in county Clare ; my father seemed to fret 
 very much as I was going, but he began to resume his 
 usual course of life. He saw to his farm, he used to go 
 into Cashel, and he was busy in completing the negotia- 
 tions for a purchase of land. He was then gradually 
 losing the use of his right hand. His writing had always 
 been bad, but now his signatures were quite illegible, and 
 he became unable even to sign his cheques. My mother
 
 326 CHARLES BIANCOXI. 
 
 used to sign the cheques for him, and he made a mark 
 by the side of her name. He was still full of business ; 
 he used to have his farm report brought in to him every 
 morning, and his interest about it and about the people 
 on his property was yet keen and strong. 
 
 I had been a month or five weeks away when I got 
 a telegram saying that my father had had a paralytic 
 stroke. I rushed off as fast as I could, leaving my 
 boy behind me at Limerick, and found my father very 
 heavy and depressed, though he was suffering no pain. 
 Later in the day, when my little boy arrived, the poor 
 old man brightened up wonderfully, and every morn- 
 ing he used to have him for awhile put on the bed 
 beside him. 
 
 He would now and then rouse himself, and for some 
 days he could receive the sacraments, and also listen to 
 his clerk, who came in to him daily to report on the 
 contents of his letters. Though he could not read these 
 letters he discovered, about a week before his death, an 
 error of eightpence in the deduction for poor-rates out 
 of a large rent-cheque. For the last two days, except 
 at odd intervals, he hardly seemed to notice anything ; 
 he lay back with his eyes closed, breathing heavily. 
 The day before he died he did not seem to heed the 
 little child on his bed, though the boy kept crawling 
 about and calling to the old man to speak to him. He 
 did not even seem to notice when the little fellow's soft 
 lips touched him. He did not bid us good-bye, and 
 I have no last word of tenderness to recall. The day 
 before his death my mother asked him if he would
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF MY FATHER. 327 
 
 communicate, and he said, quite plainly, "With the 
 blessing of God." Soon afterwards she asked him if 
 he suffered pain, and he said, " No pain ;". he then dozed 
 off, and from that torpor he never awoke. His face 
 was calm and placid, and at last he passed away very 
 quietly, and we just saw his head drop back on to James 
 ISweetman's shoulder. 
 
 It seems to me to be almost needless to say with what 
 sorrow the news of his death was received, or what 
 respect was paid to his dead body. While he lay dead 
 the house was thronged with people coming to pray 
 beside him and to bid him a mournful farewell. His 
 funeral was more than half-a-mile long; the people 
 carried his coffin on their shoulders from the parish 
 church to the little mortuary chapel, and I never saw 
 shown stronger feelings of sympathy and respect. 
 Gentle and simple, all came to his funeral old friends 
 of his that I hardly remembered, poor old Bian men 
 that I did not know even by sight all came to pay 
 their last tribute to their good old friend, and say, 
 " God be merciful to him ! : 
 
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