Colonel Doran made a gallant struggle to stem the revolution, but found himself powerless. His wife had a strong and ruthless will. Remonstrances merely led to scenes: the lady, with a red face, stormed and scolded; she assured him that he was a fool, living in an old barrack, and being ruined by a pack of greedy parasites, and that she would never stand by and calmly witness such extravagance. So at last, for the sake of a quiet life, the unhappy gentleman succumbed; he was alive to the fact that his marriage had been a terrible mistake, but he bore his sufferings with a patience and resignation that was almost oriental in its character. He busied himself beyond the scope of Julia’s operations, became a justice of the peace, farmed, hunted, and took up the broken links of ancient family friendships.
As far as lay in his power, the Colonel helped his poor dependents: in secret, and out of his own pocket he remitted rents, or bought on the sly a cow or an ass; for Mrs. Doran was a woman of business. Precisely like the model French wife, she kept the keys, the accounts, and all domestic power, in her own hands, and, but for her streak of hard greed, was an admirable manager.
The Dorans had two children, both boys--Barker, the elder, was stout, lumpish, black-eyed,--his mother’s favourite, and a Barker, as she proudly proclaimed. Ulick, the second, was a slender, delicate child, with clear-cut features, and large grey eyes. As he resembled the Dorans, his mother did not care for him; he was strong-willed, undemonstrative, and passionately attached to his father.
When Ulick was seven years of age, and Barker nine, Colonel Doran caught a bad cold, which developed into pneumonia, and died suddenly. Being much respected, he was accorded that final tribute and compliment, a great funeral; it was more than two miles long, and the boast among his retainers for many years.
“A nice, quiet kind man. God rest him! A real gentleman,” was his epitaph; and some went so far as to add--
“Faix, he has had a poor sort of life, and maybe he is glad to be out of it.”
Ten years had elapsed since the great funeral. The boys were growing up. Ulick’s godfather, Major Sutton, had sent him to Wellington, and occasionally invited him to London for a week, but Barker remained in Ireland, under his mother’s supervision, qualifying for the position of Master of Kilmoran; he had been a short time at school, and then, in answer to his fervid representations, his devoted parent had installed him at home with a resident tutor, whilst Ulick went to Sandhurst; for Ulick had decided to follow the usual career of a younger son, and was resolved to be a soldier.