Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

1853.]

ARRIVAL AT NEW YORK.

33

York. Three days later they were off Cape Hatteras. Mitchel thought of the Bermudas, lying on their starboard beam, and at no very great distance; and his mind wandered back to the ten months he had spent there and to the years that had since passed :—

I can fancy that I see the baleful cedar-groves blackening the eastern horizon. What change has come for the better, since I ruminated there, four years ago, in my cell of pain? If I am to consider myself a "martyr," has my martyrdom done any service to my cause? or the reverse? If I regard myself as a mere prisoner, fraudulently seized upon, and cruelly used, what chance have I ever for justice in my own person, to say nothing of justice for my country? Here I am now, with all dungeons behind me, and a wide world just opening before-that is to say, the time of irresponsible idleness and midsummer nights' dreams is past; the time of responsible action in broad day is upon me. Shall I do good, or evil in my generation? Or would it be better that I had died amongst those black cedars there, and had been buried in that foul cemetery, where all the dust is dust of demons!

A gloomy question to press itself upon me now, just as I am about to tread the land of Washington! I am going to be a demigod for two or three weeks-so my American friends warn me, with many a prudent caution-going to have a reception, and dinners, and shall be material for paragraphs in the morning papers. If I were a fool, I would be happy.

He was neither very happy nor very sanguine. He did not indeed despair of the cause which he believed to be just; but I find in the "Journal," shortly after the passage last quoted, a slightly modified version of a famous Latin proverb, which probably represented with approximate accuracy his view regarding the future of the human race in general, and of the Irish part of it in particular, “Magna est veritas, et non praevalebit."

On November 29, 1853, John Mitchel with his wife and

VOL. II.

D

family landed at New York. His brother William and T. F. Meagher stepped on board to welcome them. They were conducted direct to Brooklyn, where Mitchel's mother and sisters, and Mrs. John Dillon, were waiting to receive him; and here ends the "Jail Journal."

( 35 )

CHAPTER II.

NEW YORK-TUCALEECHEE COVE.

1853-1856.

THE story of John Mitchel's life during the thirteen years which succeeded his landing in New York has been written by himself in what he called a continuation of the "Jail Journal." This supplemental journal, however, was in strictness not a journal at all. It was not written during the period covered by it, but afterwards. Some admirers. of the "Jail Journal" suggested to Mitchel, at a late period of his life, that a continuation of the "Journal" would be welcomed by his friends. In compliance with this request, he undertook to write the continuation. It was published in weekly parts in the Irish Citizen, during the years 1869 and 1870; but it has never appeared in book form. In point of literary power, the continuation is very decidedly inferior to the original " Journal." Still, it is John Mitchel's own account of his life during the period covered by it; and while I deem it best to make this life of Mitchel complete in itself, I would here remind the reader of the advice offered at page 253 of Volume I. From 1848 to 1866 the best life of John Mitchel is that to be found in his "Jail Journal," and in the continuation thereof.

Upon his arrival at New York, in November, 1853, Mitchel went direct to his mother's house at Brooklyn. During the period of his captivity, his mother, brother, and

sisters-indeed, the whole Mitchel family-had emigrated to America. Mrs. Mitchel had heard of her son's escape, and had made her preparations to receive him. When he walked up to the door of the house in which his mother lived, he was surprised to see his own name upon the doorplate. His mother had furnished the house nicely, and had fitted up one room expressly for P. J. Smyth. The house was situated on Union Street, near the corner of Hicks Street, and in this house Mitchel continued to reside until he removed to East Tennessee. Of course, there was great excitement over his arrival, no end of deputations, addresses, processions, freedoms of cities, and hand-shaking. After the first five days, his right hand was quite swollen and painful, and for one day he was obliged to wear his right hand in a sling and to offer his left. Of these deputations and hand-shakings he says :—

This sort of thing went on for three or four nights; there seemed no end to the societies, clubs, companies, that each made it a point to come and welcome me to their hospitable land. Now it would be a most formidable body of piratical-looking fellows with glittering axes-the ship-carpenters, at your service, bearded, brawny. And as to their hand-shake, one had better shake hands with a vice. Then would follow several delegations from benevolent societies, with ribbons in their button-holes; and multitudes of little speeches had to be made-nonsensical enough, to be sure, but reporters of the morning papers were at our elbows taking down every word.

New York seems to have been a surprise to Mitchel in many ways. In particular, he was struck with a phenomenon which is to-day even more apparent and more wonderful than it was in 1853

I am bound to say, also, that I find it, in other and more important respects, a very grand and wondrous city. Consider this one fact: Since I arrived here, only a few days ago, a great

1856.]

BANQUET AT NEW YORK.

37

many thousands of Irish men and women (about eleven thousand per week) have been emptied out of emigrant ships upon these quays. This is not counting Germans. Now, what becomes of these people? They are not to be seen crowding the streets and making mobs; they do not organize themselves to rob houses and cut throats; in fact, they are not seen at all: the potent vital force of this mighty country somehow absorbs them at once; they permeate and percolate through the community, and find their place and find their work. They get into railroad cars on the very evening of their arrival, and are whirled away to where loving friends are awaiting them on the banks of the Wabash, or hard by some bright lake of Michigan; or else they get immediate occupation in this city itself, where there is always a fine demand for broad shoulders and willing hands. This phenomenon is, on the whole, the most wonderful and admirable thing I have seen in New York.

At New York, as at San Francisco, he had a public reception and a banquet. The reception was at the City Hall, the banquet at the Broadway Theatre. In an interesting “Reminiscence of John Mitchel," supplied to me by Dr. Thomas Hunter, the President of the Normal College of New York, I find a passage in which the reception banquet is referred to. The passage is further interesting as giving the general impression which Mitchel, at this time of his life, produced upon the writer :

"The first time I saw Mr. Mitchel was at a banquet given in his honour soon after his arrival in New York from Australia. The great lawyer, Charles O'Connor-himself the son of a '98 rebel-very appropriately presided; and thus '48 and '98 clasped hands across the festive board. This was in the winter of 1853-54. John Mitchel was then in the prime of his manhood, a little above the middle height, with a frame compact and well-proportioned, and a finely formed head resting on a strong and graceful neck. His face was a clear pale; his eyes a grey-blue; his hair a dark brown; his features faultless, with that indescribable

« AnteriorContinuar »