The Knight Of Cheerful Countenance

Book 227: Virago Modern Classics

by Molly Keane

Genres: General Fiction; Classics; Women's Fiction; Romance

Synopsis

To Ballinrath House, where purple bog gives way to slate-coloured mountains, comes Allan to visit his Irish cousins. No sooner has he arrived than he falls in love with Cousin Ann, though it seems that she only has eyes for Captain Dennys St Lawrence.

Release date: May 2, 2013

Publisher: Virago

Print pages: 169

Sample

The Knight of Cheerful Countenance was my first novel. I was seventeen years old when I wrote it. Re-reading it now, some seventy years later, I am forced to accept that the world of my youth has vanished and that, for the modern reader, there may be some explaining to do.

During the days of my childhood and girlhood, in the earlier years of the twentieth century, the title “daughter-at-home” carried no stigma as it did later. Daughters were not educated to fit them for any job, and life in the family had many advantages and pleasures. One was sure of a horse and two or three days’ hunting in the week. A dress allowance, if meagre, was a certainty. Travel expenses were paid. With a full staff of servants, there was nothing in the way of housework to be done. A girl with a talent for music or painting had leisure to practise her art.

Maiden or widowed aunts were an accepted part of any ascendancy family. Sitting in their long, elegant skirts, they seemed as stable a part of the house as the lean, grey chimney stacks built by their forebears. There was a certain glory in their ignorant defiance of bad times to come. They spent their eyesight and skill on the restoration of tapestries and were knowledgeable and tender gardeners. Even my Aunt Bijou, a tough lady in all things, grew the poppy Mecanopsis Baileyii where its blue flowers might float in the shelter of a hazelnut walk, and would go out on the coldest night to put a stable lantern near some delicate darling, while the woman in the gate lodge might die in childbirth for all she knew or cared.

Servants were numerous, even in the smaller houses of the landed gentry. In the more important houses, they were so numerous that only the butler was known personally to his employer. He was always called by his surname, while the first and second footmen, no matter how often they changed, were always “John” and “George” in order to save their employer from having to tax his memory with new names. The cook was always “Mrs”, no matter how youthful or unmarried she might be—a custom maintained to emphasize the authority of her position in the household. The kitchen maid was nameless.

Our mothers never went into the kitchen if they could help it. I knew one kitchen that had a gallery round it so that the mistress of the house might call a chosen menu from it or, if necessary, let a written order float its way down to the recipient.

Food and its cooking was not discussed and appraised as it is today. Mrs Beeton was the bible of the kitchen and, when religiously and extravagantly followed, the food was excellent. But there were kitchens and cooks who had never heard of her, and few mistresses of the house showed any proper interest in the subject. However, the ingredients of the day were often so ambrosial as to demand only the plainest cooking. Wine was an accepted necessity for sauces. Without frigidaires, everything from spring lamb to green peas was eaten in its season. Game was well-preserved and plentiful. Grouse-shooting began, as always, on the Holy Twelfth of August, when we walked the mountain with the “guns”, perhaps leading the pony that carried a vast luncheon picnic. A little later, snipe came in their hundreds to the vast stretches of undrained bogland. In the hardest winter, woodcock found shelter in the deep glens. Even the plainest cook knew enough to undercook such game, and the memory of its flavour and tenderness stays with those who expected and appreciated perfection in their eating.

Puddings played a more important part than now. Fruit from the kitchen garden was there in season and, out of season, well-preserved in the skilful bottling that took the place of freezing. Queen of Puddings or chocolate soufflé were abiding favourites for party lunches. For everyday eating, no one despised a steamed marmalade or lemon sponge. Custard was made as an accompaniment to most desserts and rich cream in a squat silver jug was always on the table.

Breakfasts were really memorable. Porridge and cream were usual as a first course. A grill of bacon and tomatoes and scraps of game hovered on the sideboard, together with a kedgeree, a vast ham and boiled eggs, preferably brown. Coffee, always in a silver coffee-pot, waited on the spirit-heated hot-plate with hot milk and cream at hand. Scones, toast and marmalade concluded the meal, which was eaten by even the stoutest.

Morning prayers were a daily ceremony, performed after breakfast. I remember the butler quietly shrouding the parrot’s cage. Before removing it, he walked very softly so as not to disturb the bird into a screaming fit. After that, he rearranged the chairs—a carving chair placed separately from them, like a pulpit. He returned later, leading the procession of capped and aproned domestic servants, headed by the cook. The family came in later. The prayer reader was the head of the family, unless a cleric happened to be a house guest.

In the ’twenties and earlier, families of the ascendancy divided themselves sharply from the “proles” (the word deriving from “proletariat” and comprising those in business, the law and even, sometimes, the Church). Marriage beneath one’s social status was looked on as a disaster and almost never occurred, no matter how scarce the contemporary and social equals of the young ladies of the time. I once asked why we knew nobody who lived in the neighbouring river valley and was told: “Because all their grandfathers married the dairy maid.” Seduction was understandable; marriage not.

The sons of the ascendancy invariably went to English public schools, and afterwards into the Army, the Navy, or perhaps the Diplomatic Service, if their languages were good. As a matter of course, the eldest son was heir to the estate, large or small, and to any money that went with it. The younger sons might starve out the middle and end years of their lives on whatever pensions they had attained in the forces. These younger sons often had graceful names, probably from their mothers’ side of the family. I had an Uncle Vivian and an Uncle Sholto, and I had a friend with an Uncle Hyacinth. He is still Major Hyacinth Devereaux on his memorial tablet in the Parish Church. Daughters had to make do with Alice or Edith or Harriet. Eldest sons and heirs could remain Henry down the generations.

The prolonged celibacy of a gentleman went unquestioned in those days. Lack of finance to set up a matrimonial establishment was a readily accepted reason for a long bachelor life in which a man, unencumbered by family, could enjoy, for free, all the outdoor sports at which he managed to excel. The very few with a literary turn were shunned as penniless “creeps” and were a source of embarrassment in conversation where horses, hunting and racing were the accepted topics. Another admissible reason for a single life was that given by a bachelor brother: “Of course I do mean to marry her, but she must realize that horses come first.”

The title “ascendancy” was invented to describe the class of English settler who had obtained grants to land from the English conquerors of the Irish Celtic kings. Queen Elizabeth I, with Essex as Governor, was the first English monarch who decided to settle Ireland as a colony rather than a battlefield. Her example was followed by James I and Charles I. Cromwell was a reliable grantor of lands to officers whom he was unable to pay—and the same applies to Dutch William. Most of those who benefited were Protestants, as Catholics were suspected of French sympathies and loyalty to James II.

Over the years, the language difference widened between the landowners and the native Irish, but with this widening grew a deep appreciation of the felicity and acumen of the Irish-into-English speech. It was the “refined” speech of the “proles” that brought out the unborn Nancy Mitford in everyone, and John Betjemen in a few. I remember being told: “Never say ‘material’. Say ‘stuff’. Even if the person doesn’t understand you, keep saying ‘stuff’.”

Memories and impressions come back to me as clear and searching as the bell in a Chekhov play. I can still hear the sound of carriage wheels on gravel or macadam and the slam of the silver-crested door on the dark blue brougham that took us to dancing class and tea-parties. And in the hall I can see the silver hand-candlesticks with their saucer-shaped bases, and a tiny glass globe over the candle flame. They were set out early in the evening on an oak chest, one candle for each member of the family and one for each guest staying in the house.

At bedtime, it was customary for a gentleman to hand a lady her candlestick as they said “goodnight”. All downstairs rooms were lighted by oil lamps, the globes of their oil containers sitting high on silver standards. In the dining-room, there was a great branched candlestick on the table—sufficient light for the butler or parlourmaid to serve by.

With hot water dependent on the mood of the Eagle range in the kitchen, the hip bath before the bedroom fire was a luxury enjoyed by the older ladies. The bedroom fire was lighted about eight o’clock, when tea was brought to the bedside, the china invariably patterned with tiny violets. Ladies could lie back and relax, listening to the busy crackle of sticks and wood while they waited for the warmth to grow. The younger members of the family walked the cold mile of corridor to the still colder bathroom and bathed in vast baths made of some stuff that was nearly marble. Only after a cold day’s hunting were we allowed the luscious comfort of a hip bath set to wait before the bedroom fire; great cans of hot water sitting on a thick batmath (always with the word BATHMAT printed in large letters on it) and a large bath-towel baking on the ex-nursery wire fender with its brass rail.

To excel as a horsewoman was the ambition of most of us. Even without achieving that object, our horses were a source of unparalleled interest and enjoyment. But dress had to be our first consideration in life. With Dublin a distant shopping place seldom attained, catalogues from such shops as Debenham and Freebody, illustrating the discreet fashions of the day, were of great value and use. The village dress-maker made or altered all our clothes, following Debenham’s inspirations as closely as she was able. Dance dresses, usually of brocade, had boat-shaped necklines and puff sleeves and dripped and drooped almost to the floor behind, rising to a naughtier knee-length in front. An artificial rose or gardenia was the usual shoulder-piece. Louis heels and ankle straps were invariable evening wear. For outdoors it was always laced leather or suede and very flat heels. Outdoor clothes, and those worn for race meetings, were always of the “coat-and-skirt” style. Only for the Dublin Horse Show did we wear a flowered number with an almost-Ascot hat. I can recall my real sense of shock when I saw two English debutantes leaning on shooting sticks at a ring-side, wearing navy blue sweaters and no hats. Such simplicity was not our aim. Hats were important and our felt “Henry Heaths” stayed on our heads, even at lunch parties.

Dress catalogues were not the only ones to reach Ireland. Every quarter, the handlebars of the postman’s bicycle bent beneath the load of the giant catalogues from the Army & Navy Stores, Victoria Street. They advertised pictorially, as well as descriptively, the probable tastes and needs of their distant customers. In consideration for the possible embarrassment of gentlemen with lubricious tastes, the page opposite the one which illustrated corsetry, the brassiere or split knickers was devoted to hardware, from Purdie guns to hedging tools and lawnmowers. Huge parcels of tins of coffee and China tea, as well as the more exotic groceries such as Carlsbad plums and other specialities unobtainable in Ireland, followed the perusal of the catalogues.

The warm intimacy we had with established shops has sadly lapsed. Even as a young member of an established family, one met recognition across the glove counter at Switzers—Ireland’s Harrods. There will never be another Mr Tyson, white-bearded proprietor of the gentlemen’s shirt shop, a rival to any in Jermyn Street. Hunting stocks and polo-necked sweaters were always in stock, racing colours a speciality. “Going to Leopardstown Races today? You’ll need a little change for small bets. Would you care to add £5 to your account?” Notes and cash came crisply across the counter in exchange for a possibly doubtful cheque.

Another Sacred Monster was George, Hall Porter of the Shelbourne Hotel, who knew everybody and everything. “You’re a friend of Major Watts,” he greeted me. “You should hurry to Tyson’s. He’s in there buying presents for all his lady friends.”

Country houses were often many miles distant from each other and, without telephones, friends and neighbours visited unannounced. Television and radio were undreamed of, so they, young and old, depended on each other for entertainment. Dinner dances were regular events. We danced happily to the piano and to records on the horned gramophone. Even as a child, I was popular as a good mimic. To reproduce the voice of stable-boy or cook was to be an entertainer. Perhaps the wonderful transference of Irish to English speech which I heard and mimicked taught me to listen to dialogue and, together with my small talent to amuse, fostered early, resulted in the plays written thirty years later in my life. From the age of six I was educated by governesses, with the help of Gills’ Geography (a strict torture), Henri Bue’s French Grammar and Mrs Markham’s History of England. My mother was a poet and a recluse and, with her, I read the shorter poems of Tennyson: “Beat, beat, beat, on thy cold grey shores, oh, sea …” and I learned to recite French verse, from Fables de la Fontaine, of course, and, later, with appropriate emotion: “Quand je revois ma Normandie”.

Apart from three hours of lessons in the day, life was free for us. Cars, lorries, child-stealing and abuse were as far away as television. Without question, we rode our ponies whenever and wherever we pleased. But, at fourteen, I was sent to a prim, suburban school. After my free childhood, rules and disciplines irked me unbearably. Having to ask, before a full classroom: “May I have permission to leave the room?” when I needed to go to a lavatory which I had to learn to call the “toilet”, struck me as an invasion of both liberty and good manners.

When we were told by the headmistress that a cloud hovered over the school until the girl who had thrown her orange down number eight toilet confessed, and confessed in French, nobody stifled a giggle. The situation was too serious—until the confession was made, there was to be no hockey practice. What did I, with fox-hunting behind me, care about hockey, the hockey captain or the games mistress?

It was the custom for friends to link arms on their way to a distant classroom, playing field or church. I would deliberately lag behind the clatter of twin footsteps, using the gap to mask my loneliness. Unliked and unlinked, my place was always at the back of the crocodile. I might never have become a writer had it not been for the isolation in which I suffered as an unpopular schoolgirl. My unpopularity, that went to the edge of dislike, drove me into myself. I was walking among stars that had a different birth and I certainly learned the meaning of the black word “Alone”.

The thought of home tore strips from my heart. Letters from my mother brought on such spasms of emotion as to make them almost unwelcome. I found my escape in English composition. Exaggerated essays on “home” put me back where carriage wheels still turned, and herons (birds as lonely as myself) flew over silently before dropping to a fishing ground.

At home, on holiday from the open prison of the boarding school, I read my sister’s books with ecstasy. Kipling’s Brushwood Boy set me dreaming of the purest love. Kipling was followed by a blind sailor author called Bartemeus. His Naval Officer heroes were called “Flags”, “Guns” or “Sparks”. They were not given wives or sweethearts; they belonged to us. They were ours. A little later Dornford Yates fed our romantic yearnings. His characters had real glamour. Rich and aristocratic, they travelled from one luxurious scene to the next in silver Rolls Royces. Love-making was so discreet as to be nearly unwritten: “I kiss your little hand, madame,” was as far as a yearning gentleman was allowed by Mr Yates to go. It was far enough to set our hearts beating. Undeterred by my unpopularity at school, this was the life I hoped to share.

The sparks of invention were probably ignited when I discovered my elder sister on the edge of something rather more than friendship with an attractive young man—of course, a brilliant horseman—who had been employed to make and break my father’s young horses. Of course, his social status was slightly beneath our own and, for this reason alone, he would never have been countenanced as a suitor. Before long, I was in love with him, and felt more distress than my sister when my father, perhaps sniffing the situation, dismissed him.

This first awareness of the Real Life ardour and anguish of romantic love was stopped in its tracks when I was struck down by a mysterious fever and confined to the sick-room for several long weeks. In this predicament I had to rely on my imagination and writing became my escape. The Knight of Cheerful Countenance began to take shape in my mind as I decided to write about the girl I most wished to be myself.

Molly Keane, 1993

THE local train from Scaralin clattered haltingly into its terminus, Bungarvin—which, like most Irish towns, was mainly notable for its dirt, its idlers, and perhaps for the number of RIC who had met their deaths in its licensed premises and neighbourhood.

Visitors seldom came to Bungarvin, save only those of the commerical ilk—“travelling gentlemen,” with cheap suit-cases full of still less valuable goods, to be foisted upon the small shopkeepers of the town.

It was, therefore, with some surprise that John Galvin, who successfully combined the duties of station-master and porter at Bungarvin station, saw—emerging from the door of a first-class compartment—a young, and to him an unknown man; a man moreover who, while he could by no stretching of possibilities be considered a traveller, did not sufficiently resemble any of the local gentry to be identified—with that familiarity which is so striking a feature of the modern Irish workman’s attitude towards his superiors—as “young Dennys St Lawrence,” or “One o’ thim brats o’ lads out of Trinity.”

He was a tall and slow-moving youth, with a charming smile and an admirably waisted overcoat. Clearly a Saxon, to whom it was honest John’s duty to show that such a smile, together with the wearing of spats, was not to be tolerated in an Irish Free State. Therefore did he turn his back, whistling abstractedly through his teeth, as the Saxon advanced upon him with inquiries respecting his luggage. … “Trunks, you know; should have come on an earlier train. And a bulldog in the offing somewhere. Well?”

The station-master jerked his head sideways to summons a small and dirty youth, who wore, as insignia of office, the uniform cap of his predecessor—the size of which clearly showed that the former porters of Bungarvin had been heftier men than the present representative of the race.

“Hey, Jimmie,” said the station-master, completely ignoring the tall young man, “did any trunks come in on the mail?”

“Or a bulldog? A nice beast,” interpolated Allan.

“Is it a dog?” said Jimmie mournfully. “It’s not one dog, but six o’ Misther St Lawrence’s hounds is above in the van. And as for getting them out of it, ’twould be as good for me to be ate altogether.”

“Ah, go on!” exclaimed the station-master encouragingly. “They’ll not bite you. Don’t be one bit afraid o’ them. I have more to do than to be running after young St Lawrence’s dogs, or I’d go clear the whole lot out of it meself.”

Allan, at the outset of the discussion, had hastened towards the van, and now emerged from it, without his dog, and in a distinctly dishevelled condition.

In the meantime the more practical Jimmie sped away to seek further assistance. Once outside the station, he came upon the head and fount of all the trouble, in the person of Captain Dennys St Lawrence, who was discoursing to Miss Ann Hillingdon on an evidently engrossing subject, with some earnestess. Ann was giving him a fair half of her attention; the remainder she bestowed on the good-looking chestnut mare, which backed and sidle. . .