ended uncle purposed living also. I will not describe
the wedding further than to say that my grandfather was nearly out and
out ruined by it. He and his guests all got gloriously drunk. Mr
Gillooly and Tim Laffan fell out about my mother, and came to blows in
her presence. They were separated by two of the other guests--a certain
Dan Hogan, a good-looking exciseman, who was also a suitor for her hand,
and Captain Michael Tracy, the master of a merchantman, who had lately
come home after a few successful trading voyages to the West Indies. As
he, however, was the most sober of the party, he came worst off in the
fray, and had not my mother come to his rescue with the aid of her
sisters, he would, I have an idea, have been severely handled. Whether
or not he was touched by this exhibition of her courage I do not know;
but he certainly from that day forward became her warm admirer, and
certainly if she showed a preference to anyone it was to him. I did not
suppose I had so many relations in the world as turned up at that feast,
of high and low degree: the greater number, however, it must be
confessed, were of the latter rank. The bride looked beautiful, and the
bridegroom in the height of his feelings invited all the guests to pay
him a visit that day fortnight at Ballyswiggan Castle. The bridegroom
was taken at his word, and though I rather think my Aunt Ellen might
have been somewhat annoyed, there was no means of escaping. My mother
was, however, unwilling to be present at so uproarious a scene as she
knew pretty well was likely to take place; but my grandfather and her
sisters insisted upon her accompanying them, and of course I went with
her. Some of the guests, however, were not likely to make their
appearance, and for the best of reasons Mr Laffan and Dan Hogan could
not be present, as it was well-known that no lawyer nor exciseman had
ever ventured to set foot in the district in which Ballyswiggan Castle
was situated. Most of the guests went on horseback, as the approach was
scarcely suited to wheeled carriages. My grandmother was too infirm to
move, but my grandfather mounted a rawboned back which had carried him
in his younger days, and my aunts and mother rode on their rough ponies.
Pat Brady, who, finding himself so happy on shore, had put off going to
sea, and I rode together on a beast which we had borrowed for the
occasion.

Ballyswiggan Castle was situated amidst fine wild scenery within sound