Corny

“ She bore for him all the authority of a mother; the boy had known no other, and, when a little child he had called her Mamma Corny. Mamma Corny had done her duty by him, that was undoubted; but Mamma Corny had never relaxed her rule; with an iron hand she liked to rule him now, in great things as in small, just as she had done in the days of his babyhood. ”

“ I have had a letter, too."
"It can't be true—it can't be true. He had no more thought of being married when he left here, three days ago, than I have."
"How can we tell that, Miss Corny? How are we to know he did not go to be married? I fancy he did."
"Go to be married!" shrieked Miss Corny, in a passion. "He would not be such a fool. And to that fine lady-child! No—no." ”

“ And Corny’s heart within him swelled like Sir Lancelot’s, for the mirror spoke to him as he passed and said: “Corny, lad, there’s not a guy among ’em that looks a bit the sweller than yerself. And you drivin’ of a truck and them swearin’ off their taxes and playin’ the red in art galleries with the best in the land!” ”

“ Eagerly Corny ate the sweet leaves to stay the pangs of hunger that gnawed him, and finished his meal with grass and pine-needles, calling himself a calf, and wishing his pasture were wider.
"The fellows we read about always come to grief in a place where they can shoot a bird, catch a fish, or knock over some handy beast for supper," he said, talking to himself for company. ”

“ As we intend to follow Corny's adventures, we need not pause to describe the drive, which was a merry one; with girls chattering, mammas holding on to excited small boys, in danger of flying out at every jolt, Abner joking till every one roared, Corny's dangerous evolutions with the beloved gun, and the gymnastic feats Chris performed, jumping off to pick flowers for the ladies, and getting on again while Milk and [214] Molasses tore up and down the rough road as if they enjoyed it. ”

“ Corny advanced, somewhat puzzled whether to laugh or cry, and taking the child up with a smile, he kissed it five times—for that is the mystic number—and as he placed it once more in Rose’s arms, there was a solitary tear on its cheek.
“Arra, go an’ kiss your wife, man alive, an’ tell her to have a good heart, an’ to be as kind to all her fellow-creatures as God has been to her this night. It isn’t upon this world the heart ought to be fixed, for we see how small a thing an’ how short a time can take us out of it.” ”

“ Rectus and I had ours fastened to our watch-guards, and Corny's hung to a string of beads she generally wore. We formed ourselves into a society—Corny suggested it—which we called the "Association of the Three Gray Beans," the object of which was to save each other from drowning, and to perform similar serviceable acts, if circumstances should call for them. We agreed to be very faithful, and, if Corny had tumbled overboard, I am sure that Rectus and I would have jumped in after her; but I am happy to say that she did nothing of the kind on this trip. ”

“ And where Uncle Corny still toddles up at supper-time every evening, and lays his now quivering hand upon the curls of his sturdy Godson Cornelius, and says, “You shall have all this place, my boy; for your rogue of a father is too rich to want it, with all that property in London. Let him grow houses, while you grow trees. ”

“ Corny and the wife was lyin’ awake, listenin’ to the wondherful noises that was goin’ on in the kitchen—tap! tap! like the dead-watch, only a dale loudher. Then the pig, the craythur, would let grunts out of her that was frightful. Corny gets up and stales out to thry and see what was the matther. And what de ye think it was? Nayther more nor less than the ould Leprachaun, and he mendin’ his brogues as hard as he could lick!
“‘Why, thin, what de ye mane?’ says Corny, thryin’ to look as bould as brass, for all the heart was sinkin’ in him wud the fear ”

“ A DOWNY COVE. It could hardly be expected that my Uncle Corny should grow very miserable about this matter. He knew that young people of the ordinary cast tumble into love and tumble out again, with perhaps a little running of the eyes and nose, and a hat crushed on the head, or a ribbon saturated; but nothing that penetrates the skin, far less puts a “tub of clothes,” as Mrs. Wilcox said, into the lungs. ”

“ Corny whirled around and pointed to the senior partner triumphantly. “He knows; and you ought to do as he says, Rosy.”
Company’s little right hand dropped to the side of the basket, while her round face took on a pained expression as she looked at Jack.
The big boy flushed up to his dark hair, and he dropped his eyes to the floor to follow the working of his uneasy boot. He longed to say “I think it’s ridiculous, when we are all working so hard, to give away such things to those idle, good-for-nothing Corner boys,” but a verse from the Bible came ringing through his ears. ”

“ His frank and unsuspecting nature makes him adored by all his tenantry, none of whom would wrong their king. There is not a page in which he figures that does not furnish charming reading, and there is not a reader but will resent that King Corny is made to die so early in the book. ”

“ Besides being one of the most delightful creations in romantic literature, he is an instructive study towards the comprehension of the Irish character. Macaulay pointed out, in speaking of the aboriginal aristocracy of Ireland, that Miss Edgeworth's King Corny belonged to a later and much more civilized generation, but added that, "whoever has studied that admirable portrait can form some notion of what King Corny's great-grandfather must have been like." King Corny is a most genuine character ”

“ Corny was just going to remind him that he had said this before, when Thad put his finger on his lips, and the remark was suppressed. Dory looked at them all, and found that they intended to "give him the floor;" and then he proceeded with his explanation.
"The wind don't always blow just the same," Dory proceeded; and Corny could hardly help making a comment on this sage remark. ”

“ For Uncle Corny owned a pew, and insisted upon having it, and would allow no one to sit there, without his own grace and written order. He never found it needful to go to church on his own account, being a most upright man ”

“ Corny’s two eyes was the size o’ pratie cakes, an’ his mouth so wide open that ’twas a wondher some of the fairies didn’t jump down his neck, while the hairs of his head stuck up as straigth as knittin’ needles, for he didn’t think it was over lucky to be so conveynient to the good people, and he was makin’ to go as quite as he could when what the puck did he see, as plain as the nose on yer face, but a small little spitherogue of a wrinkled red-faced ould man, an’ he workin’ away mendin’ a brogue! ”

“ I suppose it was the fine night that was in it, or the air took hoult of him, or may be the strength of the love; but, howsumever, it was Corny began to feel rale light in the head. He used to lay the blame on the good people, ‘for,’ says he, ‘sure it couldn’t be the dhrop I tuk that wasn’t enough to blind the eye of a midge,’ says he, ‘that id go get into me head that a way.’ So down he sot, just to steady himself and take a blast of the pipe, be the side of a big three that stood close to the road, and he wasn’t long there when lone behowld ye he fell hard and fast asleep. ”

“ If Corny hadn't been along, I don't believe he would have seen us at all. There can be nothing attractive to a governor about two boys. But almost any one would take an interest in a girl like Corny. The secretary was very polite to her.
Rectus now gave his throat a little clearing, and pushed off.
"Our business with you, sir, is to see about doing something for a poor queen, a very good and honest woman——"
"A poor but honest queen!" interrupted the governor, with a smile. [161]
"Oh, he don't mean a common queen," said Corny, quickly. ”

“ Out flew Corny from betune the shafts, with a wheegee aquil to any sky-rocket! Whiz! away he wint flittherin’ through the canvass, with the soles of his brogues uppermost, and the nails glittherin’ in the sun! Well, there was a party of boys and girls sittin’ round a table inside, and enjoyin’ their punch, and where the divil did the oulahn ’lite, but plop on the table in the middle of ’em! Ye could hear his four bones jinglin’, and the smashin’ of glass was hard a mile away. Oh! bad scran to the bit of me, but I thought I’d die down wud the rale dint of laughin’. ”

“ That the carving of a design so intricate, on so minute a scale, must prove tedious argued in its favor; and putting off mourning weeds for his history, he took to this new love with a complacency that excited Corny's special admiration.
"Sure, and it's a beautiful thing is religion; and the Divil fly away wid me, if I don't be afther gittin' it meself! Here's Musther Talcott: if he was fur carving a fort or a big gun, the eyes and the face of him would be little but scowls and puckers ”

“ Corney was bound 'prentice to a brogue-maker, in his native place—which is Drogheda; but, as he tells us, he was too much the lad o' wax to stick to his last, and left a good home, to seek his fortune on the wide ocean. But there's many of us have done as bad: so we shouldn't cry out upon Corney, you know;—should we, now?—The sea is the sole and only thing in the world that an English, Irish, Scotch, or Welch boy, ever feels truly and deeply in love with. ”

“ Corney, sharply. ‘Some of the old women dying, I suppose. They always die when I’m at meals. Don’t stand there, letting the cold air in, don’t. What’s amiss now, eh?’
‘Nothing, ma’am, nothing,’ replied a man’s voice.
‘Dear me!’ exclaimed the matron, in a much sweeter tone, ‘is that Mr. Bumble?’
‘At your service, ma’am,’ said Mr. Bumble, who had been stopping outside to rub his shoes clean, and to shake the snow off his coat; and who now made his appearance, bearing the cocked hat in one hand and a bundle in the other. ”

“ Cornish said feebly: "Oh, well...."
Before she willed it, she was telling him:
"He didn't. He didn't leave me," she cried with passion. "He had another wife." Incredibly it was as if she were defending both him and herself.
"Lord sakes!" said Cornish.
She poured it out, in her passion to tell some one, to share her news of her state where there would be neither hardness nor censure.
"We were in Savannah, Georgia," she said. "We were going to leave for Oregon—going to go through California. We were in the hotel, and he was going out to get the tickets. He started to go. Then he came back. ”

“ The poor girl did not know much—less than most, perhaps—even less than Billy of the charlock bouquet who had got the one parrot phrase that all flowers are beautiful in his brain; but that which I sought in her and in the pretty, lively Cornish, kitten-like girl already described, and in dozens more, does not come from reading books, nor is it found only in the intelligent. That something lacking in them which you can find by seeking in the more stolid and seemingly duller Anglo-Saxon peasant is of the race. ”

“ Corney bashfully.
"He can't live a week, the doctor says," pursued Mr. Bumble. "He is the master of this establishment; his death will cause a wacancy; that wacancy must be filled up. Oh Mrs. Corney, what a prospect this opens! What a opportunity for a joining of hearts and housekeeping!"
Mrs. Corney sobbed.
"The little word?" said Mr. Bumble, bending over the bashful beauty. "The one little, little, little word, my blessed Corney?"
"Ye—ye—yes!" sighed out the matron.
"One more," pursued the beadle; "compose your darling feelings for only one more. When is it to come off?" ”

“ Corney.
‘Very much so indeed, ma’am,’ said the beadle. As he spoke, he drew a chair beside the matron, and tenderly inquired what had happened to distress her.
‘Nothing,’ replied Mrs. Corney. ‘I am a foolish, excitable, weak creetur.’
‘Not weak, ma’am,’ retorted Mr. Bumble, drawing his chair a little closer. ‘Are you a weak creetur, Mrs. Corney?’
‘We are all weak creeturs,’ said Mrs. Corney, laying down a general principle. ”

“ One of the most pleasing traits of the Cornish people, which is but one manifestation of the spirit I have been speaking about, is their love for little children. Nowhere in the kingdom, town or country, do you see a brighter, happier, better-dressed company of small children than here in the narrow stony ways of the old fishing town. The rudest men exhibit a strange tenderness towards their little ones ”

“ At this intelligence the worthy Mrs. Corney muttered a variety of invectives against old women who couldn’t even die without purposely annoying their betters; and, muffling herself in a thick shawl which she hastily caught up, briefly requested Mr. Bumble to stop till she came back, lest anything particular should occur, and bidding the messenger walk fast, and not be all night hobbling up the stairs, followed her from the room with a very ill grace, scolding all the way. ”

“ They were all gone at last; one by one the bright windows in the hall grew dark. Cornish still sat there alone. These voices and footsteps and dim figures, moving past him thus in the darkness, had left his mind curiously vibrating. So life went by, he thought, a few careless steps together on the brief-trodden path, a few words, a few greetings, and then the darkness and silence of death. ”

“ Neither of the old men is there whom I can revere or love (except alone my grandfather, whom I love with trembling) : neither of the women any whom I like to deal with, unless it be a little maiden whom I saved from starving.
“A little Cornish girl she is, and shaped in western manner, not so very much less in width than if you take her lengthwise. Her father seems to have been a miner, a Cornishman (as she declares) of more than average excellence, and better than any two men to be found in Devonshire, or any four in Somerset. ”