breeze just from the sight of him.
There were lessons I learned from Owen O’Malley—to treat kindly with your crews but brook no complainin’, nor warfare within, for these men were clan and therefore family. “Without,” he used to say, “are the enemies, the monsters, and we will lose everything if we fight between ourselves.” Indeed, Owen’s code extended to his family on land as well—to his castles, his booleys, the septs, and the whole of the O’Malley territories. Sure there were lapses. Crimes of passion. Crimes of drunkenness, thievery, and youthful rape. But the cattle raids that were the curse of the clans all over Ireland and caused the greatest death and misery were absent in his reign. For he had sworn covenants with the neighbors on every side of him—the O’Flahertys to the south in Connamara, the Lower Burkes to the north in Mayo, and the Thomases to our back—
so my childhood was one of peace and tranquility.
Bless my father. Bless his soul for that.
My mother, well, my mother, God love her, she tried. Bein’ married to a man as strange and stubborn as Owen O’Malley was one thing. But havin’ me for a daughter on the top of it dearly tried her good nature.
Margaret O’Malley never knew what to make of me. ’Twas a constant fight, my upbringing. Once I was out of nappies, Owen wanted me with him wherever he went—riding to the boundaries of his territories, hunting fallow deer. But most of all on his ships. His great compulsion was that I should come to love the sea as he did. And he was not disappointed.
Perhaps it was the tender age at which I walked the boards, toddled them, really, but I never did fear the wide ocean nor the fearsome winds nor even the mountainous waves. They and my father’s fleet were as natural a home to me as the green rolling hills of Murrisk or the bogs of Clare Island. My first and favorite memories were of Owen standin’ me on a crate before the wheel to reach it, he urgin’ me to “steer” the ship while of course he stood behind, eye on the horizon, his own huge hands holdin’ her steady.
My poor mother. She argued with her husband and argued to no avail. Concerns that I’d grow up unfit for a good wife and mother fell on deaf ears. And all her attempts to teach me the womanly skills were ignored. That’s not to say she taught me nothing. She was, even more than my father, a keeper of tradition, of everything Gaelic. If Owen forced me into learnin’ at the monastery how to study Scripture, how to read and write in Latin—for that was the universal language of trade—
my mother imbued in me the old ways, the ancient religion, worship of the goddesses of water and war.
We were a small family, just my mother and father, my brother, and me. You might think Donal Piopa would have coveted the affection my father lavished on me, but from the beginning he was a child unto himself. ’Twas strange how purely satisfied he was with his own life. He cared nothing for the sea, and while he gave my father all the respect due him, he never strived for the sea nor any livelihood it afforded. He took pleasure from the land and the great herds of cattle which, along with my father’s maritime ventures, constituted our family’s wealth. He saw to the beeves and the sheep and the small Irish horses, lovin’ to ride across the rocky hills and marshes, keeping the boundaries of the Murrisk barony safe from intruders. And his character therefore developed fiercely, in the O’Malley tradition, though not as a seafaring man, but of the land. Later, in the rebellion, he became a great warrior, and that was why they called him “Piopa”—Donal of the pipes that the Irish played in battle.
My father was full of appreciation for my brother, that he never raised a stink about his favorite bein’ his daughter and not his son, and for findin’ his own way in life. I loved my brother too, and remember most fondly the times we ’d ride out together in the
There were lessons I learned from Owen O’Malley—to treat kindly with your crews but brook no complainin’, nor warfare within, for these men were clan and therefore family. “Without,” he used to say, “are the enemies, the monsters, and we will lose everything if we fight between ourselves.” Indeed, Owen’s code extended to his family on land as well—to his castles, his booleys, the septs, and the whole of the O’Malley territories. Sure there were lapses. Crimes of passion. Crimes of drunkenness, thievery, and youthful rape. But the cattle raids that were the curse of the clans all over Ireland and caused the greatest death and misery were absent in his reign. For he had sworn covenants with the neighbors on every side of him—the O’Flahertys to the south in Connamara, the Lower Burkes to the north in Mayo, and the Thomases to our back—
so my childhood was one of peace and tranquility.
Bless my father. Bless his soul for that.
My mother, well, my mother, God love her, she tried. Bein’ married to a man as strange and stubborn as Owen O’Malley was one thing. But havin’ me for a daughter on the top of it dearly tried her good nature.
Margaret O’Malley never knew what to make of me. ’Twas a constant fight, my upbringing. Once I was out of nappies, Owen wanted me with him wherever he went—riding to the boundaries of his territories, hunting fallow deer. But most of all on his ships. His great compulsion was that I should come to love the sea as he did. And he was not disappointed.
Perhaps it was the tender age at which I walked the boards, toddled them, really, but I never did fear the wide ocean nor the fearsome winds nor even the mountainous waves. They and my father’s fleet were as natural a home to me as the green rolling hills of Murrisk or the bogs of Clare Island. My first and favorite memories were of Owen standin’ me on a crate before the wheel to reach it, he urgin’ me to “steer” the ship while of course he stood behind, eye on the horizon, his own huge hands holdin’ her steady.
My poor mother. She argued with her husband and argued to no avail. Concerns that I’d grow up unfit for a good wife and mother fell on deaf ears. And all her attempts to teach me the womanly skills were ignored. That’s not to say she taught me nothing. She was, even more than my father, a keeper of tradition, of everything Gaelic. If Owen forced me into learnin’ at the monastery how to study Scripture, how to read and write in Latin—for that was the universal language of trade—
my mother imbued in me the old ways, the ancient religion, worship of the goddesses of water and war.
We were a small family, just my mother and father, my brother, and me. You might think Donal Piopa would have coveted the affection my father lavished on me, but from the beginning he was a child unto himself. ’Twas strange how purely satisfied he was with his own life. He cared nothing for the sea, and while he gave my father all the respect due him, he never strived for the sea nor any livelihood it afforded. He took pleasure from the land and the great herds of cattle which, along with my father’s maritime ventures, constituted our family’s wealth. He saw to the beeves and the sheep and the small Irish horses, lovin’ to ride across the rocky hills and marshes, keeping the boundaries of the Murrisk barony safe from intruders. And his character therefore developed fiercely, in the O’Malley tradition, though not as a seafaring man, but of the land. Later, in the rebellion, he became a great warrior, and that was why they called him “Piopa”—Donal of the pipes that the Irish played in battle.
My father was full of appreciation for my brother, that he never raised a stink about his favorite bein’ his daughter and not his son, and for findin’ his own way in life. I loved my brother too, and remember most fondly the times we ’d ride out together in the
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