Sherston's Progress

by Siegfried Sassoon

  It was a pouring wet morning and blowing half a gale. Kegworthy, who said he was feeling like hell, was unwilling to start, but I assured him that the rain would soon blow over. Mrs. O’Donnell came out on to her doorstep, and while we were waiting under the porch for The Mister, she asked me to try and bring him straight home after hunting. ‘The O’Hallorans are coming to dinner – and of course we are expecting you and Mr. Kegworthy to join us. But Mrs. O’Halloran’s a bit stiff and starched; and The Mister’s such a terrible one for calling on his friends on the way back; and it isn’t barley water they offer him.’ At this moment The Mister came out, looking very festive in his scarlet coat and canary waistcoat. He was optimistic about the weather and I tried to feel hopeful that I should bring him and Kegworthy home ‘the worse’ for nothing stronger than water.

  The maid now appeared carrying The Mister’s hat box and flask; he was helped into an enormous overcoat with an astrakhan collar which Mrs. O’Donnell turned up for him so that his countenance was almost completely concealed. He then put on an immense pair of fur gloves, pulled his voluminous tweed cap down over his nose, and gave Mrs. O’Donnell a blandly humorous look which somehow suggested that he knew that whatever he did she couldn’t be angry with him. And he was right, for he really was a most likeable man. ‘Now Mister,’ she said, ‘bear it well in your mind that Mrs. O’Halloran and her daughter are dining with us this evening.’

  ‘Be easy about that,’ he replied. ‘Don’t I know that Mrs. O’Halloran is like Limerick itself? Would you think I’m one to overlook the importance of her?’ With these words he plunged deliberately under the low hood of the car, settled himself down, and remained silent until we were about halfway to the meet. Kegworthy, hunched up in his corner, showed no sign of expecting his day in the country to be a success. But the driver was getting every ounce out of his engine, through the din of which he occasionally addressed some lively and topically-local comment to The Mister, who nodded philosophically from his astrakhan enclosure. As we proceeded, the road became rough and the surroundings hilly. And the weather, if possible, grew worse.

  ‘What sort of country is it we’re going to to-day?’ I enquired of the driver.

  ‘Sure it’s the wildest place you ever set eyes on. There’s rocks and crags where a jackass could get to ground and sleep easy,’ he replied, adding, ‘I’m thinking, Mr. Blarnett, that the dogs’ll do better to stay at home on such a day as this.’

  The Mister opened one eye and remarked that it would sure be madness to go up on the hills in such weather. ‘But me friend Tom Philipson will give us a bite to eat,’ he added serenely, ‘and you’ll travel far before you find the like of the old brandy that he’ll put in your glass.’ He nudged Kegworthy with his elbow, and I inwardly hoped that Tom Philipson’s hospitality wouldn’t be too alcoholic.

  For it was my solemn purpose that we should travel away from brandy rather than that it should be an object of pilgrimage. Tom Philipson, it transpired, was the owner of a big house; he also owned some of the surrounding country, the aspect of which fully justified its reputation for roughness and infertility. The village which was part of his property appeared to be an assortment of stone hovels in very bad repair.

  I may as well say at once that when we arrived at Tom Philipson’s the M.F.H. had already decided that hunting was out of the question, and was about to go home. The hounds had already departed. Hospitality was all that awaited us, and after all there was nothing wrong with an early luncheon in a spacious and remote old Irish mansion. There was nothing wrong with Tom Philipson either. He was middle-aged, a famous character in that part of the world, and had something of the grand manner about him. My recollection of him is that he was extremely good company, and full of rich-flavoured Irish talk. What could have been more delightful than to sit in a dignified dining-room and listen to such a man, while the rain pelted against the windows and a wood fire glowed and blazed in the immense fireplace, and the fine old burnished silver shone reflectively on the mahogany table? I can imagine myself returning to the barracks after such an experience, my visit having been prolonged late into the afternoon while Tom Philipson showed me the treasures of his house. What charm it all had, ruminates my imagined self, remembering that evocative portrait of Tom Philipson’s grandmother by Sir Thomas Lawrence, and the stories he’d told me about the conquests she made in Dublin and afterwards in London. Yes, I imagine myself soaking it all up and taking it all home with me to digest, rejoicing in my good fortune at having acquired such a pleasant period-example of an Irish country mansion, where one’s host reticently enjoyed showing his heirlooms to an appreciative visitor. I should remember a series of dignified seldom-used rooms smelling of the past, and a creaking uneven passage with a window-seat at the end of it and a view of the wild green park beyond straggling spiral yews, and the evening clouds lit with the purplish bloom of rainy weather.

  And then a door would be opened for me with a casual, ‘I’m not a great reader, but the backs of old books are companionable things for a man who sits alone in the evenings’ – and there would be – an unravished eighteenth and early nineteenth-century library, where obsolete Sermons and Travels in mellow leather bindings might be neighboured by uncut copies of the first issues of Swift and Goldsmith, and Jane Austen might be standing demurely on a top shelf in her original boards. And Tom Philipson would listen politely while one explained that his first editions of Smollett’s novels were really in positively mint condition….

  But this is all such stuff as dreams are made of. What authentically happened was that we had a hell of a good lunch and Tom Philipson told some devilish good stories, and The Mister was enchanted, and Kegworthy enjoyed every minute of it, and both of them imbibed large quantities of Madeira, Moselle, port wine and brandy and became very red in the face in consequence. This made me feel uneasy, especially as they seemed quite likely to sit there all the afternoon; the fact remained that at half-past three Kegworthy was lighting his second large cigar and Tom Philipson was pressing him to try some remarkable old Jamaica rum, though neither he nor the now semi-intoxicated Mister needed any ‘pressing’ at all. I felt a bit hazy in the head myself.

  Our host, however, was a man who knew how to handle an inconclusive situation. His manner stiffened perceptibly when Kegworthy showed signs of becoming argumentative about Irish politics and also addressed him as ‘old bean’. Daylight was diminishing through the tall windows and Tom Philipson strolled across to observe that the bad weather had abated, adding that our drive back to Limerick was a long one. This hint would have been lost on my companions, so I clinched it by asking for our motor. In the entrance hall, which bristled with the horned heads of sporting trophies, The Mister gazed wonderingly around him while he was being invested with his overcoat. ‘Mother of God, it must have been a grand spectacle, Tom, when you were pursuing the wild antelope across the prairie with your gun,’ he remarked, putting up a gloved hand to stroke the nose of a colossal elk. We then said grateful goodbyes to the elk’s owner, and our homeward journey was begun.

  I say ‘begun’, because it wasn’t merely a matter of being bundled through the gloom until we arrived at Mrs. O’Donnell’s door. About half-way home, The Mister – who had said nothing since his tribute to Tom Philipson’s glory as a gunman – suddenly said to the driver, ‘Stop at O’Grady’s.’

  Soon afterwards we drew up, and The Mister led the way into a comfortless little house, where Mr. O’Grady made us welcome in a bleak front room, glaringly lit by a lamp which caused a strong smell of paraffin oil to be the keynote of the atmospheric conditions. There seemed no special reason why we were calling on O’Grady, but he handed each of us a tumbler containing three parts raw whisky to one part water. While I was wondering how on earth I could dispose of mine without drinking it, my companions swallowed the fiery fluid unblenchingly, and did not say ‘No’ to a second dose. O’Grady sustained the conversation with comments on what the hounds had been doing lately and what the foxe
s had been doing to his poultry. The Mister blinked at the lamp and made noises which somewhat suggested a meditative hen. When we got up to go, he remarked in confidential tones to O’Grady, ‘I have yet to make up me mind about the little red horse that ye desire to sell me.’ This, apparently, epitomized the object of our visit to O’Grady. My head ached, but the night air was refreshing, though I had some doubts as to its effect on my obviously ‘half-seas-over’ friends. Hope died in me when The Mister, after getting into the car, instructed the driver to ‘stop at Finnigan’s’.

  I did not ask The Mister why he wanted to stop at Finnigan’s, nor did I ask him not to. At the best of times he wasn’t a man whose wishes one felt inclined to frustrate, and he was now alcoholically impervious to suggestion. He had it in mind that he wanted to stop at Finnigan’s, and he had nothing else in mind, one concluded. The only information he volunteered was that Finnigan was an old friend of his. ‘I knew him when I had but one coat to my back.’ It would have been useless to remind him that his dinner-coat awaited him at Mrs. O’Donnell’s, and that his heavily-enveloped form had been by no means steady on its legs when he emerged from O’Grady’s. There was nothing now that I could do except assist him out of the car and steer him through Finnigan’s front door, which was open to all-comers, since it was neither more nor less than a village pub. In the bar-parlour about a dozen Irish characters were increasing the sale of malted spirits and jabbering with vehement voices. They welcomed The Mister like one of themselves, and his vague wave of a fur-gloved hand sufficed to signify ‘whiskies all round’ and a subsequent drinking of The Mister’s health. ‘Long life to ye, Mister Blarnett,’ they chorused, and The Mister’s reply was majestic. ‘Long life to ye all, and may I never in me grandeur forget that I was born no better than any one of you and me money made in America.’ His voice was husky, but the huskiness was not induced by emotion. The air was thick with bad tobacco smoke and I was longing to be back in Limerick, but there was something very touching in the sight of the tipsy old Mister. There he sat in his scarlet coat, nodding his white head and beaming hazily around him, every bit as glad to be among these humble people as he had been in Tom Philipson’s fine house. More at home, perhaps, in his heart of hearts, and dimly aware of his youth and those hard times before he went to the States and – Heaven knows how – made, and failed to be swindled out of, his fortune. Kegworthy and I were completely out of the picture (I, because I felt shy, and Kegworthy because he was in a condition verging on stupor). Meanwhile Finnigan, elderly and foxyfaced, leant his elbows on the bar and held forth about the troubled state of the country. ‘There’ll be houses burnt and lives lost before the year’s ended,’ he said, ‘and you officers, friends of Mr. Blarnett’s though you be, had better be out of Ireland than in it, if you set value on your skins.’ A gruff murmur greeted this utterance, and I took a sip of my whisky, which half-choked me and tasted strong of smoke. But The Mister remained seraphically unperturbed. He rose unsteadily, was helped into his overcoat, and then muttered the following valediction: ‘I’d be remaining among you a while longer, boys, but there’s company expected at Mrs. O’Donnell’s, and it’s my tuxedo I’ll be wearing to-night and the pearl studs to my shirt.’ Swaying slightly, he seemed to be collecting his thoughts for a final effort of speech; having done so, he delivered the following cryptic axiom: ‘In politics and religion, be pleasant to both sides. Sure, we’ll all be dead drunk on the Day of Judgment.’ Table-thumpings and other sounds of approval accompanied him as he staggered to the door, having previously emptied all his loose silver into the hand of his old friend Finnigan. During the last stage of the journey he was warble-some, singing to himself in a tenor crooning that seemed to come from a long way off. I entered Mrs. O’Donnell’s door with one of them on each arm.

  Explanations were unnecessary when she met us in the hall. A single glance showed her how the day’s hunting had ended. I had brought them back, and they were both of them blind to the world.

  This was unfortunate, and should have precluded their presence at the dinner-table. But Mrs. O’Donnell had already got herself into a dark green bespangled evening dress and was deciding to be undaunted. I was about to suggest that I should take Kegworthy straight home, when she drew me aside and said in an urgent undertone, ‘They’ve three-quarters of an hour in which to recover themselves. For the love of God make Kegworthy put his head in cold water, and I’ll be getting The Mister up to his room.’ Her large and competent presence created optimism, so I carried out her instructions and then deposited Kegworthy in the drawing-room. His manner was now muzzily morose, and I couldn’t feel any confidence in him as a social asset. Mrs. O’Donnell bustled back, and she and I kept up appearances gallantly until Mrs. O’Halloran and her daughter were announced. Mrs. O’Halloran was what one might call a semi-dowager; the first impression she made on me was one of almost frumpishly constrained dignity, and the impression remained unaltered throughout the evening. She moved in an aura of unhurrying chaperonage and one felt disapproval in the background of her mind. She began by looking very hard at my field boots, whereupon Mrs. O’Donnell enlivened the situation with a fluent and even florid account of the day’s adventures.

  ‘Miles and miles they went in the wild weather, and the hounds not able to hunt – God be praised for that, for my heart was in my mouth when I thought of The Mister destroying himself over those bogs and boulders on the Mullagharier Mountains. And then what must Clancy’s car do but break down twice on the way home and they five miles from anywhere.’ Mrs. O’Halloran signified her acceptance of the story by a stiff inclination of her head, which was surmounted by two large lacquered combs and an abbreviated plume dyed purple. She herself seemed to have travelled many miles that evening – from the end of the eighteenth century perhaps – drawn over rough roads at a footpace in some lumbering, rumbling family coach. This notion had just crossed my mind when The Mister made his appearance, which was impeccable except for the fact that he was carrying in one hand a glass of something which I assumed to be whisky.

  By some Misterish miracle he had recovered his equilibrium – or leguilibrium – and was quite the grand seigneur in his deportment. His only social disadvantage was that he seemed incapable of articulate utterance. Whenever a remark was made he merely nodded like a mandarin. Kegworthy also was completely uncommunicative, but looked less amiable. We followed the ladies into the dining-room, and thus began a dinner which largely consisted of awful silences. At one end of the table sat The Mister; Mrs. O’Halloran was to the right of him and Miss O’Halloran was to the left of him. Next to Miss O’Halloran sat me; Mrs. O’Donnell, of course, faced The Mister, so Kegworthy’s position may be conjectured. He was, beyond all conjecture, sitting beside Mrs. O’Halloran.

  Mrs. O’Donnell and I did all the work. Kegworthy being a non-starter, she talked across him to Mrs. O’Halloran, while I made heavy weather with Miss O’Halloran, who relied mainly on a nervous titter, while her mamma relied entirely on monosyllabic decorum. As the meal went on I became seriously handicapped by the fact that I got what is known as ‘the giggles’. Every time I looked across at Mrs. O’Halloran her heavily powdered face set me off again, and I rather think that Mrs. O’Donnell became similarly affected. The Mister only addressed two remarks to Mrs. O’Halloran. The first one referred to the European war. ‘Tom Philipson was telling me to-day that we should be putting more pressure on Prussia.’ Mrs. O’Halloran glacially agreed, but it led to nothing further, as her attention was distracted by Kegworthy, who, in attacking a slab of stiff claret jelly, shot a large piece off his plate, chased it with his spoon, and finally put it in his mouth with his fingers. This gave me an excuse to laugh aloud, but Mrs. O’Halloran didn’t even smile. When the port had been round once The Mister raised his glass and said, with a vague air of something special being expected of him, ‘If there’s one man in Limerick I esteem, sure to God it’s your husband. Long life to Mr. O’Halloran.’ At this, Kegworthy, who had been looking more m
orose than ever, made his only audible contribution to the festive occasion.

  ‘Who the hell’s O’Halloran?’ he enquired. His intonation implied hostility. There was, naturally enough, a ghastly pause in the proceedings. Then Mrs. O’Donnell arose and ushered her guests out of the room in good order.

  There I sat, and for a long time neither of my companions moved. Closing my eyes, I thought about that dinner-party, and came to the conclusion that it had been funny.

  When I opened them again I ascertained that both The Mister and Kegworthy were fast asleep. Nothing more remains to be told, except that soon afterwards I took Kegworthy home and put him to bed.

  On my last day in Ireland I went out in soft sunshiny weather for a final half-day with the hounds. The meet was twelve miles off and I’d got to catch the 4.30 train to Dublin, so I had to keep a sharp eye on my watch. The Mister was mournful about my departure, and anathematized the Egyptians wholeheartedly, for he couldn’t get rid of his notion that it was they who were requiring my services as a soldier. I felt a bit mournful myself as my eyes took in the country with its distant villages and gleams of water, its green fields and white cottages, and the hazy transparent hills on the horizon – sometimes silver-grey and sometimes that deep azure which I’d seen nowhere but in Ireland.

  We had a scrambling hunt over a rough country, and I had all the fun I could find, but every stone wall I jumped felt like good-bye for ever to ‘this happy breed of men, this little world’, in other words the Limerick Hunt, which had restored my faith in my capacity to be heedlessly happy. How kind they were, those friendly fox-hunters, and how I hated leaving them.

  At half-past two The Mister and I began to look for Clancy’s car, which contained his groom and was to take us home. But the car was on the wrong side of a big covert, and while we were following it, it was following us. Much flustered, we at last succeeded in encountering it, and Clancy drove us back to Mrs. O’Donnell’s in a wild enthusiastic spurt.