men do on horseback against such a rush? They were on us, round us, through us, before we could get our breath. I suddenly felt one of my feet had been taken out of the stirrup-iron, and the next thing was that I was pulled out of my saddle and fell, to my surprise, on something comparatively soft. It happened to be a lady who was paying me this delicate attention, and, as I fell on her, she sat down on the ground, dropped her petticoat out of her hand, and out fell her stock of munitions. It was some little time before she found breath sufficient for her to let me know just what she thought of me for coming there to “interfere with their business.” I must have hurt her and annoyed her, for as I got up and was just mounting my horse, which one of the troopers was holding, the lady, a big strapping, fine Irishwoman, picked herself up off the ground, seized the handiest piece of road metal, and threw it, from about three yards away, at the back of my head.
I saw nothing more of the procession that day. I heard no more sounds of revelry. I woke up, late in the afternoon, not in my little side-street but in a very comfortable bed with my head duly bandaged and a nurse sitting alongside of me. I didn’t ask why or wherefore I was there. I felt it. All I said to her was, “One whisky and soda, please, quick!” which she brought and which I drank, and then she told me that it had been reported that the tail end of the procession had reached the cathedral at last. So all was well. I bear that honourable scar to this day.
CHAPTER X
SPORT IN IRELAND
Roller-skating had become the fashion in England, and three or four of us became anxious to introduce it into Ireland. We formed a small company and appointed our directors, whose business knowledge was about equal to their knowledge of the art of roller-skating at that moment. However, all went well. The rink was opened at Dublin. A club of the nicest of the nice was formed. The members practised very hard, day after day, and evening after evening, with closed doors, until we became quite artists. Then came the time to inform the public at large that the rink would be open to them every afternoon and evening, reserving Tuesday and Thursday nights for the members of the club.
From the very jump the rink was a success. The members of both sexes gave exhibitions. We played tennis on roller-skates; we danced on roller-skates; we held athletic sports on roller-skates, including steeple-chases and obstacle races. In a very short time the public at large became quite as good skaters as those who taught them, if not better. Then came the usual development that has attended similar enterprises ever since. Fancy dress balls, gymkhanas, carnivals and such like, and – what was more satisfactory to the company – money rolling in all the time. The expenses were not heavy but the dividends were, and, to our surprise, we members of our company, very few in number, found ourselves absolutely drawing a regular monthly dividend. As we were mostly poor soldiers this was highly gratifying. I remember investing my first dividend in buying a mate to “Mick Molloy.” He was much more expensive, you can guess, and I named him, following upon the naming of Mick Molloy, Larry O’Keefe.
The success of our venture in Dublin led us to thirst for further triumphs, and, at an especial meeting of the company in Dublin, it was decided to repeat the success at Limerick. So it came about that the rink at Limerick was started. We followed the same methods that had been carried out in Dublin, only we had not to undergo the probationary stage of learning to roller skate. A large party arrived from Dublin, and after one week of real joy and fun soon made the rink a success. This made us bold, so we exploited Cork and Waterford and our pecuniary successes increased daily, and some of us began to think that it would be worth while to throw up our military careers and become professional roller-skating rink promoters. That was really my first business venture. Others followed later on, as you will hear by and by, but not with the same result.
Let me tell you now what happened to Mick Molloy. He was certainly a good horse and a splendid jumper, but he had one bad fault and that was that, every now and again, apparently for no reason whatever, except the same cussedness that held him when he wouldn’t go up the hill, he would hit a bank or a wall full hard and turn head over heels into the next field. As the weather, as a rule, was moist, and there was plenty of mud about when Mick Molloy performed his athletic feat and I picked myself up from the soft ground, I generally succeeded in attaching to my person a fairly considerable amount of Irish soil. At this particular time one of the great demands by Irishmen was for what they then called “fixity of tenure.” Can you wonder that, after my repeated attempts to annex as much of Irish soil as Mick Molloy could help me to, the members of the hunt christened me “Fixity of Tenure”?
I had a visit from one of the best riders in Ireland at that time who was quartered at the Curragh, whose riding at Punchestown Races was always good to watch and who had come down for a few days’ stay with us. There was a meet of the hounds; he wanted a ride. I offered him Mick Molloy, who was in good form just then, and he accepted the offer. I warned him of his one peculiarity. The morning of the hunt we rode out together. It was in the direction of Ballynegarde. There was often a trap to be met in the way of a sunken ditch over-grown with gorse, and unless one knew the lay of it a horse was apt to rush through instead of jumping and find himself and the rider at the bottom of the sunken ditch. I had forgotten to warn the rider of Mick Molloy of this fact. We had a fine seven-mile run in the morning and killed one fox. My friend was delighted with Mick, for he had carried him to the kill without a fall. He was full of praises of old Mick.
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