Ireland -- Emigration and Immigration -- Fiction; Ireland -- Social life and customs -- Fiction
would marry you for nothing, for I cannot have any more of your
goings-on in my parish. You're the beginning of the dancing and
courting here; the ball-alley, too--I am going to put all that down.'
Julia did not answer a single word to him, and he went over to them
that were disputing about the L80, and he said, 'Now, why not make it
L75,' and the father agreed to that, since the priest said it, and the
three men thought the marriage was settled. And Father Tom thought that
he would get not less than L10 for the marrying of her. They did not
even think to ask her, and little did they think what she was going to
say, and what she said was that she would not marry any one until it
pleased herself, and that she would pick a man out of this parish or
out of the next that pleased her. Her husband should marry her, and not
so many pounds to be paid when they signed the book or when the first
baby was born. This is how marriages are settled now. Well, sir, the
priest went wild when he heard Julia speak like this; he had only just
come to the parish, and did not know how self-minded Julia was. Her
father did, though, and he said nothing; he let Julia and the priest
fight it out, and he said to the man who had come to marry her, 'My
good man, you can go your way; you will never get her, I can tell
that.' And the priest was heard saying, 'Do you think I am going to let
you go on turning the head of every boy in the parish? Do you think I
am going to see fighting and quarrelling for you? Do you think I am
going to see you first with one boy and then with the other? Do you
think I am going to hear stories like I heard last week about poor
Peter Carey, who they say, has gone out of his mind on account of your
treatment? No,' he said, 'I will have no more of you; I will have you
out of my parish, or I will have you married.' Julia tossed her head,
and her father got frightened. He promised the priest that she should
walk no more with the young men in the evenings, for he thought he
could keep her at home; but he might just as well have promised the
priest to tie up the winds. Julia was out the same evening with a young
man, and the priest saw her; and next evening she was out with another,
and the priest saw her; and not a bit minded was she at the end of the
month to marry any of them. It is said that he went down to speak to
her a second time, and again a third time; it is said that she laughed
at him. After that there was nothing for him to do but to speak against
her from the altar. The old people say there were some terrible things
in the sermon. I have heard it said that the priest called her the evil
spirit that sets men mad. I don't suppose Father Madden intended to say
so much, but once he is started the words come pouring out. The people
did not understand half of what he said, but they were very much
frightened, and I think more frightened at what they did not understand
than at what they did. Soon after that the neighbours began to be
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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