Life
?- 1935 [Mrs J. M. Callwell]; member of the Martins of Ross, Galway; contrib. Blackwood’s Magazine; author of Timothy Tatters (1892),
in which the young Rose Moore leads a ‘Land League’ with the
other children and the neighbouring boy Patsey to to frighten the English
captain who is about to marry their mother - a plot finally resolved by
his kindness after Patsey has been tried for firing a gun at him; also A Little Irish Girl (1908); d. Ballycastle. IF2
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Works
One Summer by the Sea (London: Thomas Nelson 1903), 333pp.; Timothy
Tatters: A Story for the Young Nelson (London: Thomas Nelson 1890);
192pp. A Little Irish Girl (1908); Old Irish Life (1912).
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Quotations
Timothy Tatters: A Story for the Young Nelson (London: Thomas Nelson
1892.) 192pp., with col. pls.; boys’ book; contains two chaps on
The Land League [viz., chaps. IX and X: ‘The Land League goes into
action’, and ‘The Land League comes out - rather ignominiously’].
Patsy Molloy, a runaway waif from Liverpool, returns to Ireland and is
taken in at Castlefogarty (‘not a proper castle at all’, p.30),
abode of a kindly Anglo-Irish family of the Moores, incl. the children
Ulick, and high-spirited Rose; a London engagement with Mrs. Moore, mother
of the children, brings Capt. [Edw.] Hammond to the the house (‘Unhappily
Captain Hammond did not in any way remove the unfavourable impression
his appearance had created’, p.59.) He becomes the object of a jug-of-water
prank; he puts lock and bolts on the house in times of ‘dastardly
outrage’; ‘it seemd derogatory to the dignity of a household
descended from the old Irish chiefs that this custom [of not locking]
should be altered’ (p.91.) In the course of a jape on Hammond, it
materialises that young Patsy is the Land League: ‘[...] the
Land League of Castlefogarty went to bed’ p.102; visit to Phoulaphouca
sets the novel in Co. Wicklow (p.115.) Childhood members of the Castlefogarty
(Patsy, and Johnny) Land League load pistols to shoot Hammond just as
he is saying to his companion, ‘Of course there is a good deal to
startle an Englishman’s prejudices at first ... but when one comes
to know the country better ...’ (p.134f.) Patsy is captured, brought
before magistrates and jailed at Gowran. By now the English captain turns
out to have ‘a good heart’ (p.154.) Rose bears witness at Patsy’s
trial (p.162.) Crown solicitor: ‘The wretched boy in the dock had
doubtless been a tool in the hands of others older and more depraved than
himself ...’ (p.168.) Patsy sentenced to a month in prison and five
years in reformatory; Patsy has ‘held his tongue’ and says “’twas
for Miss Rose” [implying that she is the true culprit] (p.177.) Rose
comes clean with Capt. Hammond, and Patsy is released: ‘I didn’t
mean it was harm to be an Englishman ... but we don’t like English
people over here. Don’t you see how different that makes you to us
all? You don’t like the things that we like ... You odn’t even
talk the same way, and it makes us all seem horrid and wrong, somehow.’
(p.182.) Capt. Hammond is by now ‘not unkindly’ (p.183.) ‘you
can teach me to be as Irish as you can, and I will do my best to make
you like English ways as well as Irish ones’ (p.184)’; undertakes
to train Patsy indoors as a ‘buttons’; ‘he’s a fine
little chap, and he will do well, I have no doubt in whatever walk in
life he chooses’ (p.189.) to Rose: ‘well ... if it was the land
league that made peace between us, we owe it a debt of gratitude.’
(p.192).
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References
Stephen Brown, Ireland in Fiction: A Guide to Irish Novels,
Tales, Romances and Folklore [Pt. I] (Dublin: Maunsel 1919), lists A Little Irish Girl (1908), being the doings and adventures of
a lot of very natural and human children, particularly the bright and
wild little heroine, and Manus, a typical English-reared schoolboy; peasants
seen in relation to better class ... no moralising. Ill. Harold Copping.
Further, Desmond Clarke, Ireland in Fiction [Vol. 2 of same] (1985),
lists Timothy Tatters (London: Nelson 1890 [sic]), 192pp.
Eggeling Catalogue (No. 44) lists One Summer by the Sea (Nelson 1903), 333pp,; Timothy Tatters, A Story for the Young Nelson (1892).
Belfast Central Library holds A Little Irish Girl (1908) and, Old Irish Life (1912).
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