Charles OMalley, vol 1 | Page 5

that he
was speedily recognized in print by the Marquis of Londonderry, the
well-known Sir Charles Stuart of the Peninsular campaign. "I know that
fellow well," said he, "he once sent me a challenge, and I had to make
him a very humble apology. The occasion was this: I had been out with
a single aide-de-camp to make a reconnaissance in front of Victor's
division; and to avoid attracting any notice, we covered over our
uniform with two common gray overcoats which reached to the feet,
and effectually concealed our rank as officers. Scarcely, however, had
we topped a hill which commanded the view of the French, than a
shower of shells flew over and around us. Amazed to think how we
could have been so quickly noticed, I looked around me, and
discovered, quite close in my rear, your friend Monsoon with what he
called his staff,--a popinjay set of rascals dressed out in green and gold,
and with more plumes and feathers than the general staff ever boasted.
Carried away by momentary passion at the failure of my
reconnaissance, I burst out with some insolent allusion to the harlequin
assembly which had drawn the French fire upon us. Monsoon saluted
me respectfully, and retired without a word; but I had scarcely reached
my quarters when a 'friend' of his waited on me with a message, a very
categorical message it was, too, 'it must be a meeting or an ample
apology.' I made the apology, a most full one, for the major was right,
and I had not a fraction of reason to sustain me in my conduct, and we
have been the best of friends ever since."
I myself had heard the incident before this from Monsoon, but told
among other adventures whose exact veracity I was rather disposed to
question, and did not therefore accord it all the faith that was its due;
and I admit that the accidental corroboration of this one event very
often served to puzzle me afterwards, when I listened to stories in
which the major seemed a second Munchausen, but might, like in this
of the duel, have been among the truest and most matter-of-fact of
historians. May the reader be not less embarrassed than myself, is my

sincere, if not very courteous, prayer.
I have no doubt myself, that often in recounting some strange
incident,--a personal experience it always was,--he was himself more
amused by the credulity of the hearers, and the amount of interest he
could excite in them, than were they by the story. He possessed the true
narrative gusto, and there was a marvellous instinct in the way in which
he would vary a tale to suit the tastes of an audience; while his
moralizings were almost certain to take the tone of a humoristic quiz on
the company.
Though fully aware that I was availing myself of the contract that
delivered him into my hands, and dining with me two or three days a
week, he never lapsed into any allusion to his appearance in print; and
the story had been already some weeks published before he asked me to
lend him "that last thing--he forgot the name of it--I was writing."
Of Frank Webber I have said, in a former notice, that he was one of my
earliest friends, my chum in college, and in the very chambers where I
have located Charles O'Malley, in Old Trinity. He was a man of the
highest order of abilities, and with a memory that never forgot, but
ruined and run to seed by the idleness that came of a discursive,
uncertain temperament. Capable of anything, he spent his youth in
follies and eccentricities; every one of which, however, gave
indications of a mind inexhaustible in resources, and abounding in
devices and contrivances that none other but himself would have
thought of. Poor fellow, he died young; and perhaps it is better it
should have been so. Had he lived to a later day, he would most
probably have been found a foremost leader of Fenianism; and from
what I knew of him, I can say he would have been a more dangerous
enemy to English rule than any of those dealers in the petty larceny of
rebellion we have lately seen among us.
I have said that of Mickey Free I had not one but one thousand types.
Indeed, I am not quite sure that in my last visit to Dublin, I did not
chance on a living specimen of the "Free" family, much readier in
repartée, quicker with an apropos, and droller in illustration than my
own Mickey. This fellow was "boots" at a great hotel in Sackville

Street; and I owe him more amusement and some heartier laughs than it
has been always my fortune to enjoy