The Irish standard., 1896-08-08

J. UidU Idh6u NY iuSSTS6, s4llu alUG o1INS
years my oratorical career came quite to
an end. 4 have given in an article wrote
ins the Weekly Sun a description Of what
my life was like during the three years
served my journalistic apprent ticeship in
Dublin. Twill not go back on that period
now save in the sentence or two which
bears ON the subject Of this present series
Of articles. was an ardent rather than
a well-informed Nationalist 'during g my
college days When came to Dublin /
did not change my opinions, but I
changed my point of view. Cynicism is
one of the phases through which most
youths have to pass, especially thoseSof
strong imaginations and ardent temper
aments
Thrown, while still a boy, into the COM
panionship of maturer men, and men
matured in the hard and hardening
school of journalism, was at once in
quite a.. different atmosphere from that
which I had breathed in Galway. Not
that got much from my companions
in Galway. Lived then, and for many
years after, almost wholly within the
narrow limits of my own reflections and
emotions, dreams and plans But this
inner world OF mine, III my student days,
was about as remote from the grim and
prosaic realities Of life as though ! had
been born in an enchanted castle and not
in the sQualor and gloom of a broken
down and poverty stricken Irish family:
while many of the men whom now en-
countered had already passed from yis-
ionary youth to premature and despond-
ent maturity. They had worked hard
they had lived hard. One in particular
who exercised considerable influence
over me, had left in the Jude's Music hall
at that epoch Dublin's one wild, fascin
ating, and destructive temple Of pleasure
and vice-his youth, mis- hopes and his
health. remember the first sight I
caught of this man. He was a singularly
handsome fellow, with features of almost
Greek regularity, fine blue eyes, beau-
tiful beard, carefully kept, a slight and
graceful figure, and he was for reporter,
singularly we'll dressed. But the face,
though young, was deeply lined, and
there was a look of constant and some
what peevish dependency upon it. I
don't know which considered the great
er mark of distinction at that time-the
well-made coat the white watstcoat, the
light brown overcoat, or the look Of suf-
fering, of mental and physical decay
that had come from Jude's Music hall.
I was boy enough to have an intense adj
miration for the splendid sinner.
There was another reporter, whom I
did not meet till a little later, who ex-
ercised an even deeper influence over
me- He was not so old as the other man,
nor so broken. But he also had lived
hard; had a. highly nervous and highly
imaginative temperament, a more than
average amount of Celtic wildness of
temper and impulse; withal he had one Of
the most picturesque pens, and un-
doubtedly the most picturesque conyer-
sation ofany man have ever met. Both
these men: had very keen. sense of hui
NOR, and delighted In the bringing down
all that was $romantic and poetic to the
grim and sordfd light Of reality as sseen.
through the glasses Of 9 Journalist II re-
member was brought up--like most
Irish youths-in the memories of the men
who had made what is known in Ireland
as the '4S movement My father had
been forty-eight man himself. re-
member still the old files-covered with
-disarranged and never touched
which were in small loft in my fathers
house, and which contained the hot Cos
pei with which the youth of my father
had been fired. Unsuccessful struggle
with poverty and other things had chang,
ed my fathers mood from those. old days;
but he occasionally spoke of them. /
lived near enough to them to still feel
something of the auroral ardor with
which the chfvalry, the very fine poetry,
and, above. all, the eloquent speeches
from the dock of that period, still gildsd
the horizon Of Irish political dreams. You
will judge, then, of the effect upon me OF
the remark made by one of my friends
that one of the speeches from the dock, a.
speech that is historical and, probably,
immortal, had BENNY friend said
handed in a manuscript to the reporters
before it was uttered! Nowadays I
should see very little in this; but in those
days of dreams and absurd illusions
there was something extremely contra
dictory and disillusioning in the. idea Of
a speech from the dock, and, as it ap-
peared, at the foot of the gallows, pre-
pared with great care and in type before
it. was delivered. ALI these things, as
we'll as an intense desire for self-culture
and the completion of my education in
classic and continental languages, made
me forget that ] had ever spoken to lis
tendng and admiring audiences.
Different circumstances produced the,
same result when l came to London. I
suddenly found myself reduced to the life
of a notwithstanding nobody7-unknown
by everybody. The shyness and self-ab-
sorption of my boyhood had brought
their Nemesis. have had many miser-
able epochs in my life; the first months
Of my employment as a journalist in
Ld:ndon are amongst the most miserable.
In my journalistic field In Dublin !.
was accustomed to go about from place