Previous - next
II. at New-market, and won the plate there and the attention of the
august sovereign.
Although he was only the second son of our family, my dear father
came naturally into the estate (now miserably reduced to L400 a
year); for my grandfather's eldest son Cornelius Barry (called the
Chevalier Borgne, from a wound which he received in Germany)
remained constant to the old religion in which our family was
educated, and not only served abroad with credit, but against His
Most Sacred Majesty George II. in the unhappy Scotch disturbances in
'45. We shall hear more of the Chevalier hereafter.
For the conversion of my father I have to thank my dear mother, Miss
Bell Brady, daughter of Ulysses Brady of Castle Brady, county Kerry,
Esquire and J.P. She was the most beautiful woman of her day in
Dublin, and universally called the Dasher there. Seeing her at the
assembly, my father became passionately attached to her; but her
soul was above marrying a Papist or an attorney's clerk; and so, for
the love of her, the good old laws being then in force, my dear
father slipped into my uncle Cornelius's shoes and took the family
estate. Besides the force of my mother's bright eyes, several
persons, and of the genteelest society too, contributed to this
happy change; and I have often heard my mother laughingly tell the
story of my father's recantation, which was solemnly pronounced at
the tavern in the company of Sir Dick Ringwood, Lord Bagwig, Captain
Punter, and two or three other young sparks of the town. Roaring
Harry won 300 pieces that very night at faro, and laid the necessary
information the next morning against his brother; but his conversion
caused a coolness between him and my uncle Corney, who joined the
rebels in consequence.
This great difficulty being settled, my Lord Bagwig lent my father
his own yacht, then lying at the Pigeon House, and the handsome Bell
Brady was induced to run away with him to England, although her
parents were against the match, and her lovers (as I have heard her
tell many thousands of times) were among the most numerous and the
most wealthy in all the kingdom of Ireland. They were married at the
Savoy, and my grandfather dying very soon, Harry Barry, Esquire,
took possession of his paternal property and supported our
illustrious name with credit in London. He pinked the famous Count
Tiercelin behind Montague House, he was a member of 'White's,' and a
frequenter of all the chocolate-houses; and my mother, likewise,
made no small figure. At length, after his great day of triumph
before His Sacred Majesty at Newmarket, Harry's fortune was just on
the point of being made, for the gracious monarch promised to
provide for him. But alas! he was taken in charge by another
monarch, whose will have no delay or denial,--by Death, namely, who
seized upon my father at Chester races, leaving me a helpless
orphan. Peace be to his ashes! He was not faultless, and dissipated
all our princely family property; but he was as brave a fellow as
Previous - next
