IRISH AIR, No. XXI. "I will not be deceived again !” No. XXII. "O'Rourke's Noble Feast" No. XXIII. "I will neither spin tow nor flax" No. XXVI. "I was sleeping last night" No. XXVII. "The Two-penny Jig" No. XXVIII. "The Humours of Castle Lyons" No. XXIX. "The Rose in full Bloom" No. XXX. "The Birds are dreaming" No. XXXII. "The Humours of Mäm” No. XXXVII. "The Jolly Old Woman" No. XXXIX. "The Peeler and the Goat" CONTENTS. GERALD KIRBY; A TALE OF THE YEAR 'XCVIII :-CHAP. VIII PAST AND PRESENT STATE OF AFGHANISTAN :— CHAP. II.—NAMES, LOCALITIES, &c. OF THE PRINCIPAL TRIBES, CLANS, AND CITIES; 1. CITY OF HERAT AND TRIBES NORTH OF THE CABUL RIVER, VIZ.—IMAKS, HUZARAHS, TAJIKS OF KOHISTAN, AND Berduranis. 2. PESHA-WUR AND EASTERN TRIBES,-KUTTUKS, KHYBERS, LOHANIS, SOLYMAN TRIBES, CAKERS, &c. 3. GHILJI TRIBES AND CITIES OF CABUL AND GHUZNI; DURANI TRIBES. 4. TRIBES AND CITY OF CANDAHAR, -FROM ALEXANDER THE MACEDONIAN TO THE ARAB CONQUEST IN THE EIGHT CENTURY. - ARAB CONQUEST TO MAHMUD GHUZNI AND HIS DYNASTY. - - MAHMUD GHURI TO THE EMPEROR BABER. FROM THE DEATH OF BABER TO THE DEFEAT OF THE GHILJIS BY NADIR SHAH. FROM THE FOUNDATION OF THE DURANI EMPIRE IN 1747 BY IRISH AIR, No. XXI. "I will not be deceived again" No. XXII. O'Rourke's Neble Feast" DUBLIN: SAMUEL J. MACHEN, 8, D'OLIER-STREET. MDCCCXLII. All communications for the EDITOR of the DUBLIN MONTHLY MAGAZINE must be addressed to the care of Mr. MACHEN, 8, D'OLIER-STREET. Advertisements and Books for Review to be forwarded to the same. We cannot undertake to return short pieces, either prose or poetry. Contributions intended for insertion in the succeeding number must be forwarded on or before the first Saturday in the month. It is requested that persons sending to the publishers for MSS. will state in full the title of the paper required, and the name or initials affixed to it; as several mistakes have occurred for want of this precaution. The owners of the MSS. named in detail on the fly leaf of our number for March, are requested to send for them, as we cannot undertake to be answerable for the safe keeping of papers not claimed within a certain period. W. H. B-F. X. K.-Vauria-" On Amelia; The Elder Brutus, &c."-" The Persian Ambassador"-" A Trip to Wicklow"-do not suit us. LORD BROUGHAM. We have been requested to state that the anecdote regarding Lord Brougham, told in a note to page 111 of our February number, is incorrect. We shall at all times be ready-as we feel bound to be in the present instance-to express our regret at being misled into any statement calculated to wound unnecessarily the feelings of any man. THE PILOT. We have always been averse to noticing anonymous comments on the management of our Journal. But a letter, signed "Catholicus," which appeared in the DUBLIN PILOT of the 3d of June, having excited some remark, and having been made the ground of extravagant misrepresentation by persons who had evidently never seen the passage complained of,--we feel called upon to state, for the information of our friends and the public, that when our attention was called thereto, we at once addressed a letter to the Editor of the Pilot, in which, while we accounted for the accidental appearance in our pages of a note, which had little or no connexion with the text to which it referred, we took occasion to comment, in extenso, on the extraordinary conduct of the correspondent of the Pilot, in seeking to fix on us, upon such grounds, a stigma of illiberality and intolerance. The length of our letter precluded its appearance at that time in the columns of the Pilot; but the Editor, in his publication of the 8th of June, when expressing his regret at not having room for the entire reply, quoted two paragraphs, which he stated to be, in his opinion, quite sufficient to rebut the charge brought against us. And, indeed, when our readers learn, that the imputation was one of a wish upon our part to cast a slight upon the religious opinions of the great body of the Irish people, whose cause, through many discouragements and difficulties, we have unweariedly striven to serve, we are sure they will think, that without a word from us, the whole tenour and tendency of our labours at once amply refuted any such insinuation. The letter to which we have alluded above, we do not see any reason for giving publicity to, through any other channel than the one in which the charge against us first appeared: that would be conferring an undue importance on the hasty and ill-considered censures of a nameless assailant. But we recommend that individual, when he next appears before the public, to do so in a better temper, and to reserve the delicate appellations of "crime," with which he designated the careless expression of our contributor-and viper," with which he favoured ourselves, for offences of a deeper dye than the present occasion of his wrath, and for delinquents of another character than the Editor of the only literary periodical, whose advocacy, at this moment, the Irish people can boast of. ERRATA IN OUR NUMBER FOR JUNE. Page 461, 8th line from bottom, for "preserved," read “treasured." Page 462, 9th to 13th line, read thus-"For a people there is no immortality; "though each individual man shall be clothed with new life, upon the tomb of the "nation no RESURGAM' can be written. Hence the history of a nation that has "ceased to be, carries with it a more mournful interest, than any accounts of the "life of an individual man can possibly excite in us." Printed by Webb and Chapman, Gt. Brunswick-street. THE DUBLIN MONTHLY MAGAZINE. GERALD KIRBY:-A TALE OF THE YEAR 'XCVIII. CHAPTER VIII. GERALD Kirby having been interrupted when detailing to Nora on a former occasion the particulars of his early life, the task has devolved on us of relating them; but in doing so we must step back over a few years, and introduce to the reader other scenes and characters than those with whom he has been acquainted in the preceding pages. Maurice Kirby's family, consisting of three sons (the youngest of whom was our hero,) and two daughters, occupied a comfortable farm-house in that part of "The Golden Vale" which extends into the County Limerick. He was in the most comprehensive sense a prosperous man; and when looking on the fine forms of his two grown up sons, John and Connor, and the Milesian beauty of his fair-haired daughters, Grace and Ally, he raised his head with a look of proud consciousness of the blessing he possessed in so fine a family; or turning to regard his tidy old wife, as she sat at her wheel, would say, "Well, Mauradeen, you may be proud of the boys and girls you reared." "Yes, Maurice dear, we have the boys, God bless them, strong enough to carry our coffins to the churchyard, though indeed, asthore, I hope 'twill be many a long day till then." A fine summer Sunday is always a day of enjoyment to the Irish peasant, and the period of which I now write being antecedent to that of the Irish rebellion, the assembling of the people at dances and hurling matches had not been prohibited, nor the young people dispersed by the swords of the yeomen and military as in subsequent times. It was after one of those happy meetings, (a dance at the cross roads,) that Grace and Ally Kirby might be seen returning home, accompanied by a man whom it was evident they wished to shake off, and the looks of their brothers who walked after plainly expressed he was not a welcome addition to their party. This person was known by the "sobriquet" of Michael Dharra, or Red Mick, and being an assistant of the tithe proctor, was hated in proportion to the exactions of his principal, whose counsellor he was deemed to be in all deeds of oppression. Grace and her sister were, as I before observed, specimens of Irish beauty, both fair, blue-eyed, and delicate beyond what could be expected JULY.-1842. 21 in their rank of life, though not unusual in our peasant country women. Habited alike, for they were twins, and their strong resemblance to each other remarkable, the long scarlet cloth mantle set off their slight graceful figures; and without bonnet or cap their profusion of sunny hair was partially confined at the back of their heads by the national bodkin, and bound back from the forehead by a gay blue ribbon. Light-hearted and happy, they had been that day the beauties of the rustic dance, and with all the glee of girlish vanity gratified to the full by the admiration they had excited, they were returning to the farmhouse, when the unwelcome attentions of Michael Dharra threw a gloom over their smiling faces, causing them to forget all the previous enjoyments of the day in the annoyance of this man's presence. On their arrival at home, Maurice, who met them at the door, looked with astonishment on the person by whom they were accompanied, and, contrary to the usages of hospitality, did not invite him to enter, while from his parting salute the young men turned away with scowling brows of scorn and dislike. This man had sent the Shrovetide before to make proposals of marriage for Grace Kirby, which from his general character were indignantly rejected, and it was considered an instance of great presumption that he should have expected they would be acceptable. He felt this conduct on the part of her family as an insult, which festered long and sharply in the recesses of his evil heart; but when he that evening saw Grace and her sister the objects of general admiration, and heard the sounds of applause with which they each time took their places in the dance, where, in gowns of dark green home-made stuffs and snowwhite muslin handkerchiefs and aprons, they shone unrivalled beauties of the happy circle, all his fancy (he called it love) for Grace returned, and wishing to contradict the rumours of the previous rejection of his suit, he had commenced plaguing the sisters with his attentions, which caused them to leave the scene of their amusement much earlier than usual, though it did not answer the purpose of ridding them of their tormentor. Alas for the peace of the farmer's family! From that evening might be dated the beginning of misfortunes which ended in the overthrow of all their happiness. Those who beheld Michael Dharra tracing with hurried steps the path which led from the farm-house that evening, marked in his downcast look and the compression of his long skinny lip, that thoughts of vengeance were busy in his blackened heart; and some of the gay-hearted dancers, as they encountered him on their return homeward, might be seen turning from his path with such words as "I'll be bound Michael Dharra is plotting mischief now"-" God help the crathur that's in your thoughts now, Michael Dharra, you thief of a proctor's man; though if you heard me now, 'tis little but you'd swear my life away for a baubee." Such were the remarks, though not in his hearing, of those who knew him well-and they did not judge erroneously; for on that night he had solemnly vowed his soul to the devil, to be revenged of the Kirby family. The sequel will prove the compact was well kept. |