Patrice de Mac Mahon

“ Though the volumes of Lord Mahon are distinguished by research and varied learning, by a spirit at once candid, patient, and investigating—though his lordship possesses considerable ability as a narrator, and is a master of a style at once easy, flowing, and thoroughly English, yet with all his calm discrimination, and all his spirit of truth and justice, there 18 something of the leaven of old Toryism about his tone of thought. ”

“ Each had the marks as of a battle about him—bandaged heads, tied-up arms, a strip of dirty rag round a knee—and each man had a bottle between his legs and a chunk of cheese in his hand. Mahon got up. With his handsome and disreputable head, his hooked profile, his long white beard, and with an uncorked bottle in his hand, he resembled one of those reckless sea-robbers of old making merry amidst violence and disaster. ‘The last meal on board,’ he explained solemnly. ‘We had nothing to eat all day, and it was no use leaving all this.’ He flourished the bottle and indicated the sleeping skipper. ”

“ I do not mean to reflect upon the respectable part of the population of Mahon, for there is not a more kind-hearted or gentle people in the world. But ignorance of the language compels most of our officers to keep aloof from a society, which, if it do not increase the refinement of their manners, should at least protect them from moral degradation.
DISADVANTAGES OF MAHON
Apart from all moral considerations, there are political ones why Port Mahon should not be the winter rendezvous of our squadron in the Mediterranean. ”

“ He left Kimberley on May 3, and on the following day Mahon set out from Barkly West on his 230 miles' march to Mafeking. Mahon advanced wide of the railway up the Hart's River, which joins the Vaal at Barkly West, his right flank being covered by Hunter, who kept close to the Vaal. Mahon met with no serious resistance until he had covered 200 miles of his journey, when he found a force which had been sent down from Mafeking across his path, and which diverted him to Massibi; where he joined Plumer on May 15. ”

“ Mahon—being an instance. There is no gold lace or cocked hat about him. He is, in attire, probably the strangest figure in the campaign. Picture to yourself a square-built man of middle age, wearing an ordinary brown cap (not a service one) , a khaki coat with an odd sleeve, breeches, and box-cloth gaiters, carrying a hooked cherrywood stick, and smoking a briar, and you have General Mahon.
And now listen to this little story about him. A few days ago a Tommy was chasing a chicken near a farm on the line of march. ”

“ It is no more than justice to say that the faults of Lord Mahon’s book are precisely the faults which time seldom fails to cure, and that the book, in spite of those faults, is a valuable addition to our historical literature. ”

“ While ladies interpose, and slaves debate."
Lord Mahon has conferred essential obligations on English history. He has brought to the annals of the British empire during the eighteenth century, qualities nearly the reverse of those of Mackintosh, but which are, nevertheless, not less essential than those of the Scotch philosopher, for a right appreciation and correct delineation of the period. He is a scholar, a gentleman, and a man of the world. ”

“ In 1768 he was elected member for Calne, and his entry into Parliament was hailed as a great gain to the Whig party.
"Among the new accessions to the House of Commons at this juncture," writes Lord Mahon, "by far the most eminent in ability was John Dunning. ... He was a man both of quick parts and strong passions; in his politics a zealous Whig. As an orator, none ever laboured under greater disadvantages of voice and manner ”

“ They had destroyed our sails, consumed more stores than the crew, affably shared our beds and our dangers, and now, when the ship was made seaworthy, concluded to clear out. I called Mahon to enjoy the spectacle. Rat after rat appeared on our rail, took a last look over his shoulder, and leaped with a hollow thud into the empty hulk. We tried to count them, but soon lost the tale. Mahon said: ‘Well, well! don’t talk to me about the intelligence of rats. They ought to have left before, when we had that narrow squeak from foundering. ”

“ And he so wrought upon Mahon that he determined to adopt his brother’s advice, and they called an assembly of the tribe, who with one heart gave their voice for war. From that time forward Mahon and Brian grew stronger and stronger. They gained a great victory over the foreigners at Limerick, plundered their goods and sacked the fort; after that they set fire to the town and reduced it to ashes, and they banished Ivar, Prince of Limerick, to Wales. The soldiers of the Norsemen, who were billeted on the people, and did them grievous wrong, were driven out, and Mahon reigned as undisputed king. ”

“ There are two other individuals, who come and go at the Court—the only ones holding out, and likely to hold, against change of any kind. For Major Mahon is still Major Mahon, rolling on in his rich Irish brogue, as ever abhorrent of matrimony. No danger of his becoming a benedict! And as little of Miss Linton being transformed into a sage woman. It would be strange if she should, with the love novels she continues to devour, and the "Court Intelligence" she gulps down, keeping alive the hallucination that she is still a belle at Bath and Cheltenham. ”

“ Mahon, so kind and affable; and the boys and girls of the family were waiting to take their seats. The party paused, while, according to the good old-fashioned custom (now too often neglected) , grace was said; and Cousin Irene, contemplating the bright faces and pleasant surroundings, thought she had seldom seen a more attractive picture. But now she noticed that May, after a quick look around, appeared startled and anxious. The next moment the foolish girl exclaimed:
"O Mrs. Mahon, there are thirteen of us here! You do not like to have thirteen persons at your table, do you? ”

“ Embarrassed when ringing Major Mahon's door-bell, he is still more so inside that room, while awaiting the man to whom his card has been taken. For he has intruded himself into the house of a gentleman a perfect stranger to himself, to call his guest to account. The act is inexcusable, rude almost to grotesqueness!
But there are other circumstances attendant, of themselves unpleasant enough. The thing he has been tracking up is no timid hare or cowardly fox; but a man, a soldier, gentleman as himself, who, like a tiger of the jungles, may turn upon and tear him. ”

“ Johnson himself and perhaps Lord Thurlow.
We have no more room for further extracts; those we have made illustrate the temper and the style of the work, and will commend it to the favorable consideration of American readers. Among subjects treated most elaborately is that of the authorship of Junius; but Lord Mahon has no new facts for the vindication of his judgment, that Sir Philip Francis was unquestionably the writer of the famous letters under that name. ”

“ It is not such harmless game the bloodhounds of the Rue des Victoires scent out.’
‘Was it, then, some mere delusion drove him from the service?’ said I, surprised.
‘I never said so much as that,’ replied Jacques. ‘Colonel Mahon has foul injury to complain of, but his present sufferings are the inflictions of his own terror. He fancies that the whole power of France is at war with him; that every engine of the Government is directed against him; with a restless fear he flies from village to village, fancying pursuit everywhere. Even kindness now he is distrustful of ”

“ In the first place, the name Aodh, which has been metamorphosed to Hugh, is not synonymous with it, for the name Aodh signifies fire, but Hugh, which has been borrowed from the Saxon, signifies high or lofty. Since, then, they bear not the same meaning, and are not made up of the same letters, in what, may it be asked, does their identity consist? It is quite obvious that they have nothing in common with each other. In the second place, Mahon, or, as Sir Richard Cox writes it, Mahoone, is not Matthew; for if we believe Spenser and some Irish glossographists, Mahon signifies a bear ”

“ Not one of us is a whit better or more moral than if he wore the livery of a king, and carried a crown on his shako instead of that naked damsel that represents French Liberty. Mahon is the luckiest fellow going, and, I heartily believe, the most deserving of his fortune! And see if General Moreau be not of my opinion.
There he is on the balcony, and she is leaning on his arm.’
‘Parbleu! the major is right!’ said another ”

“ At the age of eighteen Mahon composed a paper in French on the pendulum, which the Academy of Stockholm rewarded with a prize and printed. He wrote, at Geneva in 1773, a volume, printed in 1775, of 'Considerations on the Means of preventing Fraudulent Practices on the Gold Coin.' The coin was to have very little relief, and the date was to be sunk in. The dangers to be guarded against were false coining, clipping, milling, and sweating. Very soon after its composition the Stanhopes returned to England, and Mahon threw himself with ardour into politics. ”

“ On the 20th of June, off Maritimo, he received a despatch from St. Vincent that a reinforcement of twelve ships-of-the-line from the Channel was then approaching Port Mahon, and that Keith, having returned thither, had left again in search of Bruix, whose whereabouts remained unknown. ”

“ Kate Mahon proves equal to the occasion; showing herself quick witted, as her brother boasted her to be.
On the third day after, she is able to report to him; that some time previously, how long not exactly known, a young English girl came to the convent, brought thither by a priest named Rogier. The girl is a candidate for the Holy Sisterhood—voluntary of course—to take the veil, soon as her probation be completed. Miss Mahon has not seen the new novice; only heard of her as being a great beauty; for personal charms make noise even in a nunnery. ”

“ Now the blacksmith knew of whom the boy had reminded him. It was of that little lost lad of the Renardys.
“But that was seven long years ago, as you said,” replied the blacksmith, “and by this time Phil would be about fourteen years old. You will never be him.{100}”
“Nevertheless I am,” said the boy. “It was the giant Mahon McMahon that stole me away seven years ago when I was playing near the cliffs, and I have been living with him and serving him ever since, and in the halls of the giant we who serve him never grow old, but stay as we were when he first brought us there.” ”

“ Then Mahon was murdered by some such treachery as stains so many pages of Irish history, and Brian became king of all Munster. His first work was to punish his brother's murderers, which he did with grim celerity, so that, as the chronicler puts it, they soon found that he "was not a stone in place of an egg, nor a wisp in place of a club, but a hero in place of a hero, and valour in place of valour." ”

“ Disembarking at a little quay below the town, we confided our valises to a porter and followed him up a steep, cobbled street to the Hotel Bustamante, a very respectable inn in the higher quarter, where we were promptly accommodated with rooms and board at a pension of six pesetas a day.
Seen at close quarters, Mahon is singularly uninteresting and commonplace. If the architecture of Palma is essentially Spanish, and that of Iviza Moorish, Mahon must be put down as painfully and typically English. ”

“ PORT MAHON
Mahon, so named from Mago, the brother of Hannibal, is the chief town of the island of Minorca. It is beautifully situated at the northwest extremity of one of the most secure and spacious harbours in the world. This port, since the first introduction of a U. S. naval force in the Mediterranean, subsequent to the war with the free-booters of Barbary, has, with few exceptions, been the winter rendezvous of our squadrons stationed in that sea. ”

“ But M‘Mahon, although a clever person, was, like many an honest fellow, vastly more candid when he got “the sup in” than he had ever intended to be; indeed, in these circumstances, whatever a man thinks often comes out in spite of him, as if it disagreed with his liquor! Thus, one unfortunate night, “Doctor M‘Mahon, the apothecary,” (as he was termed in Aungier-street,) having made too free amongst his brother-aldermen, and been completely overmastered by the blue jug, forgot his company, and began to speak rather unkindly of King William. ”

“ The queer dying fellow’s beyond looking over the ditch. He’s come up, I’m thinking, stealing your hens. (Looks over his shoulder.) God help me, he’s following me now (he runs into room) , and if he’s heard what I said, he’ll be having my life, and I going home lonesome in the darkness of the night. (For a perceptible moment they watch the door with curiosity. Some one coughs outside. Then Christy Mahon, a slight young man, comes in very tired and frightened and dirty.) ”

“ The action imposed upon the French fleets was, however, consistent with the general policy of the French government and John Clerk was probably right in saying that there is apparent in this action off Minorca a tactics too well defined to be merely accidental,--a tactics essentially defensive in its scope and aim. [4] In assuming the lee-gage the French admiral not only covered Mahon, but took a good defensive position, imposing upon his enemy the necessity of attacking with all the consequent risks. ”

“ MAHON.
slightly emotional from his drink.—I’m poorly only, for it’s a hard story the way I’m left to-day, when it was I did tend him from his hour of birth, and he a dunce never reached his second book, the way he’d come from school, many’s the day, with his legs lamed under him, and he blackened with his beatings like a tinker’s ass. It’s a hard story, I’m saying, the way some do have their next and nighest raising up a hand of murder on them, and some is lonesome getting their death with lamentation in the dead of night. ”