Irish Journal (12 page)

I drew a breath, a long breath, in order to correct the myth; it did not seem fair toward either Rommel or Henry or history to leave things as they were—but the boat had already been cast loose, and Crusoe-Mephistopheles had started up the engine, and I called across to the island: “Rommel was not the war—and Henry wasn’t a hero, far from it,” but probably the old man had only understood three of the words: Rommel, Henry, and hero—and once again I shouted the single word: “No, no, no, no.…”

On this little island in the Shannon, where a stranger seldom sets foot, perhaps tales will be told beside darkly glowing hearths, fifty or a hundred years from now, of Rommel, of war, and of Henry. Thus it is that what we call history penetrates into remote corners of our world: not Stalingrad, not the millions murdered and killed, not the mutilated faces of European cities—war will be known by the words Rommel, fairness, and for good measure Henry, who was there in person and called out in the blue darkness “No, no, no!” from the boat as it moved off—a word so easily misunderstood and for that reason so suitable for the making of a myth.…

George stood beside me laughing; he too had caught a myth in his whirring camera: St. Ciaran’s chapel in the dusk and the old man, white-haired, lost in thought; we could still see his thick, snow-white hair shining far off against the wall of the little harbor—a touch of silver in the ink of twilight. The little island, the kingdom, sank into the Shannon with all its errors and all its truths, and Crusoe-Mephistopheles, who was at the tiller, was smiling peacefully to himself: “Rommel,” he murmured; it sounded like an incantation.

16
NOT A SWAN TO BE SEEN

The red-haired woman in the compartment was talking quietly to the young priest, who looked up every now and then for a few seconds from his breviary, went on murmuring, looked up, then closed his breviary and devoted himself entirely to the conversation.

“San Francisco?” he asked.

“Yes,” said the red-haired woman, “my husband has sent us over; I’m going to see my parents-in-law, I’ve never met them. I have to get out at Ballymote.”

“There’s plenty of time yet,” said the priest in a low voice, “plenty of time.” “Really?” asked the young woman softly. She was very tall, fat, and pale, and sat there with her child’s face like a great doll, while her three-year-old daughter had taken the priest’s breviary and was giving an excellent imitation of his murmuring. The young woman was already lifting a hand to punish the little girl, but the priest held her arm back.

“Don’t stop her, please,” he said quietly.

It was raining; water was running down the window panes, farmers were rowing outside across their flooded fields to fish up their hay from the water; washing hung on
hedges, at the mercy of the rain, wet dogs barked at the train, sheep scampered away, and the little girl was saying her breviary, weaving into her murmurs names which she remembered from her evening prayers: Jesus, Holy Mary, and making room for the poor souls too.

The train stopped, a soaking wet porter passed baskets of mushrooms into the baggage car, unloaded cigarettes, the bundle of evening papers, then helped a woman standing in the rain to open her umbrella.…

The stationmaster looked wistfully after the slowly departing train; sometimes he must ask himself whether in reality he isn’t a cemetery custodian: four trains a day: two up, two down, and sometimes a freight train ambling sadly along as if it were going to the funeral of another freight train. In Ireland the barriers at level crossings do not protect cars from trains, they protect trains from cars; they are not opened and closed toward the road, the line is blocked across the tracks; in this way the neatly painted stations look something like miniature health spas or sanatoria, the stationmasters are more like orderlies than their military-looking colleagues in other countries, who are always standing in the smoke of engines, the thundering of trains, saluting freight trains dashing by. Flowers grow around the little Irish railway stations, neat, well-tended beds, carefully pruned trees, and the stationmaster smiles into the departing train as if to say: No, no, you’re not dreaming, it’s really true, it’s really four-forty-nine, as my clock up there shows. For the traveler is sure the train must be late: the train is punctual, but the punctuality seems deceptive; four-forty-nine is too precise a time for it to be correct in these stations. It is not the clock that is wrong, but time, which uses minute hands.

Sheep fled, cows stared, wet dogs barked, and the farmers rowed around in boats on their fields and fished up the grass in nets.

A gentle singsong flowed rhythmically from the little girl’s lips, articulated Jesus, Holy Mary, wove in the poor souls at
regular intervals. The red-haired woman grew more and more anxious.

“No,” said the priest softly, “there are two more stations before Ballymote.”

“In California,” said the young woman, “it’s so warm, there’s so much sunshine. Ireland seems quite strange to me. I’ve been gone fifteen years; I always count in dollars, I can’t get used to pounds, shillings, and pence any more, and you know, Father, Ireland has got sadder.”

“It’s the rain,” said the priest with a sigh.

“Of course, I’ve never been this way before,” said the woman, “but in other places, years ago, before I went away; from Athlone to Galway—I’ve done that bit often, but it seems to me that fewer people are living there than before. It’s so quiet, it makes my heart stand still. I’m afraid.”

The priest said nothing and sighed.

“I’m afraid,” said the woman in a low voice. “From Ballymote I have to go another twenty miles, by bus, then on foot, across the bog—I’m afraid of the water. Rain and lakes, rivers and streams and more lakes—you know, Father, Ireland seems to me to be full of holes. The washing on these hedges will never dry, the hay will float away—aren’t you afraid too, Father?”

“It’s just the rain,” said the priest, “don’t let it worry you. I know that feeling. Sometimes I’m afraid too. For two years I had a small parish, between Crossmolina and Newport, and it often used to rain for weeks, the storm would blow—nothing but the high mountains, dark green and black—do you know Nephin Beg?”

“No, I don’t.”

“It was not far from there. Rain, water, bog—and when someone took me to Newport or Foxford, always water—past lakes or past the sea.”

The little girl closed the breviary, jumped up on the seat, put her arms round her mother’s neck, and whispered: “Are we going to drown, really?”

“No, no,” said her mother, but she did not seem very convinced herself; outside the rain splashed against the panes, the train plodded wearily into the darkness, crawling as if through clouds of water. The little girl listlessly ate a sandwich, the young woman smoked, the priest picked up his breviary again; now—without realizing it—he imitated the little girl, the names Jesus Christ, Holy Ghost, Mary, emerged from his murmuring, then he closed the book again. “Is California really so beautiful?” he asked.

“It’s wonderful,” said the woman, hunching her shoulders with a shiver.

“Ireland is beautiful too.”

“Wonderful,” said the woman, “really, I know it is—don’t I have to get out here?”

“Yes, at the next station.”

As the train entered Sligo it was still raining; kisses were exchanged under umbrellas, tears were wept under umbrellas; a taxi driver was asleep over his steering wheel, his head resting on his folded arms; I woke him up; he was one of those pleasant people who wake up with a smile.

“Where to?” he asked.

“To Drumcliff churchyard.”

“But nobody lives there.”

“Maybe,” I said, “but I’d like to go there.”

“And back?”

“Yes.”

“All right.”

We drove through puddles, empty streets; in the twilight I looked through an open window at a piano; the music looked as if the dust on it must be an inch thick. A barber was standing in his doorway, snipping with his scissors as if he wanted to cut off threads of rain; at the entrance to a movie a girl was putting on fresh lipstick, children with prayer books under their arms ran through the rain, an old woman shouted across the street to an old man: “Howya, Paddy?” and the old man
shouted back: “I’m all right—with the help of God and His most blessed Mother.”

“Are you quite sure,” the driver asked me, “you really want to go to Drumcliff churchyard?”

“Quite sure,” I said.

The hills round about were covered with faded ferns like the wet hair of an aging red-haired woman, two grim rocks guarded the entrance to this little bay: “Benbulbin and Knocknarea,” said the driver, as if he were introducing me to two distant relations he didn’t much care about.

“There,” said the driver, pointing to where a church tower reared up in the mist; rooks were flying round the tower, clouds of rooks, and from a distance they looked like black snow-flakes. “I think,” said the driver, “you must be looking for the old battlefield.”

“No,” I said, “I’ve never heard of any battle.”

“In 561,” he began in a guide’s mild tone of voice, “a battle was fought here which was the only one ever fought in all the world on account of a copyright.”

I shook my head as I looked at him.

“It’s really true,” he said; “the followers of St. Columba had copied a psalter belonging to St. Finian, and there was a battle between the followers of St. Finian and the followers of St. Columba. Three thousand dead—but the king decided the quarrel; he said: ‘As the calf belongs to every cow, so the copy belongs to every book.’ You’re sure you don’t want to see the battlefield?”

“No,” I said, “I’m looking for a grave.”

“Oh yes,” he said. “Yeats, that’s right—then I expect you want to go to Innisfree too.”

“I don’t know yet,” I said; “wait here, please.”

Rooks flew up from the old gravestones, circled cawing around the old church tower. Yeats’ grave was wet, the stone was cold, and the lines which Yeats had had inscribed on his gravestone were as cold as the ice needles that had been shot
at me from Swift’s tomb: “Cast a cold eye on life, on death. Horseman, pass by!” I looked up; were the rooks enchanted swans? They cawed mockingly at me, fluttered around the church tower. The ferns lay flat on the surrounding hills, beaten down by the rain, rust-colored and withered. I felt cold.

“Drive on,” I said to the driver.

“On to Innisfree then?”

“No,” I said, “back to the station.”

Rocks in the mist, the lonely church, encircled by fluttering rooks, and three thousand miles of water beyond Yeats’ grave. Not a swan to be seen.

17
IN A MANNER OF SPEAKING

When something happens to you in Germany, when you miss a train, break a leg, go bankrupt, we say: It couldn’t have been any worse; whatever happens is always the worst. With the Irish it is almost the opposite: if you break a leg, miss a train, go bankrupt, they say: It could be worse; instead of a leg you might have broken your neck, instead of a train you might have missed Heaven, and instead of going bankrupt you might have lost your peace of mind, and going bankrupt is no reason at all for that. What happens is never the worst; on the contrary, what’s worse never happens: if your revered and beloved grandmother dies, your revered and beloved grandfather might have died too; if the farm burns down but the chickens are saved, the chickens might have been burned up too, and if they do burn up—well, what’s worse is that you might have died yourself, and that didn’t happen. And if you should die, well, you are rid of all your troubles, for to every penitent sinner the way is open to Heaven, the goal of our laborious earthly pilgrimage—after breaking legs, missing trains, surviving all manner of bankruptcies. With us—it seems to me—when something happens our sense of humor and imagination desert
us; in Ireland that is just when they come into play. To persuade someone who has broken his leg, is lying in pain or hobbling around in a plaster cast, that it might have been worse is not only comforting, it is an occupation requiring poetic talents, not to mention a touch of sadism: to paint a picture of the agonies of a fractured vertebra, to demonstrate what a dislocated shoulder would be like, or a crushed skull—the man with the broken leg hobbles off much comforted, counting himself lucky to have suffered such a minor misfortune.

Thus fate has unlimited credit, and the interest is paid willingly and submissively; if the children are in bed, racked and miserable with whooping cough, in need of devoted care, you must count yourself fortunate to be on your feet and able to look after the children. Here the imagination knows no bounds. “It could be worse” is one of the most common turns of speech, probably because only too often things are pretty bad and what’s worse offers the consolation of being relative.

The twin sister of “it could be worse” is an equally common phrase: “I shouldn’t worry”—and this among people who have every reason not to be
without
worry every minute of the day and night; a hundred years ago, during the great famine, with several consecutive crop failures, that great national disaster which not only had immediate devastating effects but the shock of which has been handed down through generations to this day—a hundred years ago Ireland had some seven million inhabitants, Poland probably had just as few at that time, but today Poland has more than twenty million inhabitants and Ireland scarcely four million, and Poland—God knows—has certainly not been spared by its powerful neighbors. This dwindling from seven to four million among a people with a surplus of births means a great tide of emigrants.

Parents watching their six (often eight or ten) children grow up would have reason enough to worry day and night, and no doubt they do worry, but with that submissive smile they too repeat the phrase: “I shouldn’t worry.” As yet they
don’t know, nor will they ever know exactly, how many of their children will populate the slums of Liverpool, London, New York, or Sydney—or whether they will be lucky. But one day the hour of farewell will come, for two out of six, for three out of eight: Sheila or Sean will go off to the bus stop, cardboard suitcase in hand, the bus will take them to the train, the train to the boat; floods of tears at bus stops, at railway stations, at the dock in Dublin or Cork in the wet, cheerless days of autumn—across the bog past abandoned houses, and not one of those who stay behind weeping knows for sure whether they will ever see Sean or Sheila again; it is a long way from Sydney to Dublin, from New York back here, and many do not even return home from London—they will get married, have children, send money home, who knows?