Castle Rackrent

Sir Condy Rackrent, heir to Castle Rackrent, was born to little fortune of his own and trained in law. Thady thinks that if Condy had borne the drudgery of study, he could have made King’s Council. Jason was a favorite with Sir Condy, as was Thady, who used to tell him stories of “the family and the blood from which he was sprung,” and that he would inherit it if the present man died without children (39). Thady finds that when Condy comes back from Dublin, he seems like the same man and just as beloved by Thady.

In his first year of inheriting the estate, Sir Condy cannot earn a penny and is obligated to pass new bonds. Jason, by now an established agent, “explained matters out of face to Sir Conolly,” and with a great nominal rent roll it is all paid away in interest (41). Jason then wants to be paid for his years of free service to the family. Condy gives him a “bargain of some acres which fell out of lease at a reasonable rent” (41). Jason meanwhile, rents the land to under-tenants and earns £200 a year. However, Condy gives the hunting lodge on the Rackrent estate that Jason has his eye on to Captain Moneygawl of Mount Juliet town. A complication ensues when old Mr. Moneygawl’s youngest daughter, Miss Isabella, falls in love with Sir Condy and wants to marry him, even though her father threatens to disown her if she does. Originally, Sir Condy prefers the poor but pretty Judy M’Quirk, a relative of his who is “worth twenty of Miss Isabella,” but begins to change his mind and thinks to carry Isabella to Scotland and elope with her (43).

Unable to decide between the two women, Sir Condy takes a halfpenny from Thady’s hand and declares “‘a toss up’” (44). Swearing by Thady’s ballad book, which he mistakes for his Catholic prayer book, Sir Condy marks the halfpenny’s smooth side with a cross and pronounces that side is Judy M’Quirk. But when the coin comes down, it falls on Isabella’s side. Condy is devastated by the outcome, but feels he has to go through with the vow.

When Isabella and Condy return from Scotland, Thady suspects that his new mistress is mad because she covers her face with a veil, quotes dramatically from plays, and is prone to hysterics. Though Isabella is cut off from her family as a result of the marriage, she has a few thousand pounds of her own, left to her by a grandmother. The newlyweds set about making visits around the county, and in fine style. With her flair for drama, Isabella also turns the barrack room into a theatre, caring little for how much it costs. Sir Condy acquiesces to these demands, as long as he can have his whiskey punch to himself at night. Isabella makes a fuss, saying that she does not like the smell of whiskey and says that Sir Condy does not love her, though he reassures her it is the opposite, while still continuing to see Judy on the side.

The couple hugely exceed their income and soon enough, trades folk are coming round to the estate “with bills as long as [one’s] arm of years and years of standing” (52). Jason encourages Sir Condy to confront the bills, but this proves too much for him, when he is in bed hungover in the morning, drinking at night, and not wanting to do business in between. As a result of this extravagance, the lower orders at Castle Rackrent are living hand-to-mouth. Jason, meanwhile, sees the opportunity to buy the hunting lodge from Sir Condy, in order to relieve his debts a little. 

When a general election is called, Sir Condy stands as candidate, throwing an extravagant feast as part of the campaign. Following his election victory, “shoals of people from all parts” claim they have voted for Sir Condy because he has promised them significant rewards and promotions (59). Beleaguered by the untenable promises he has made, Sir Condy and his wife repair to Dublin, so that he can attend his parliamentary duty there.

Thady misses the family while they are in Dublin and he is left in an ill-repaired Castle Rackrent. He does not hear any news from the family in ages, but when he does, Condy has apparently been “very ill used by the government about a place that was promised him and never given” (61). Jason also gives up, saying that he is done with the Rackrents and that they will soon be looking for another agent. Thady is upset by Jason’s attitude and feels that the latter has styled himself as a gentleman and looked down on him, since taking up at the lodge.

Condy and Isabella return to Rackrent in June and are so besieged by debts that their furniture stands to be auctioned off. Condy wonders if Isabella’s relatives will do anything for them. In a conversation between the couple, Isabella is poring over a letter and then says to Condy that she was a child when she married him and requests to live with her father’s family. He agrees to her request and she signs a “memorandum” marking their separation (70). Isabella leaves Castle Rackrent in the jaunting car, the only available vehicle.

After Isabella leaves, Condy is in trouble and Castle Rackrent is being seized by the extortioners, who include, to Thady’s horror, his own son Jason. Jason, who has been studying the law and is now an attorney, points to the balance, “which was a terrible sight to my poor master” because there are thousands of units of debt and he has no idea how he will pay it back (74). Jason’s solution is that Condy should “‘go to the land,’” or in other words, sell the land to him (75). He even has a deed of sale drawn up. Thady is horrified, saying “‘what will people think and say, when they see you living here in Castle Rackrent, and the lawful owner turned out of the seat go his ancestors, without a cabin to put his head into, or so much as a potatoe to eat?’” (77). Jason withholds the whiskey punch from Condy, so that no one can say that he was drunk when being made to sign.

Thady is heartbroken and the mob shares this sentiment, preferring that Condy and not Jason should rule over them and chanting, “Sir Condy Rackrent for ever!” (79). When Jason gets frightened and asks for Sir Condy’s advice, the latter generously recommends that they should both show themselves at the window and explain that Sir Condy is going to the lodge forever, “for a change of air for [his] health” (79).

The very next day, Sir Condy goes to the lodge, accompanied by Thady, who tries to cheer him up by telling him how beloved he is by the entire county. Thady goes around the county to the people who Sir Condy knew when he was with Isabella and tries to borrow some cash from them. While they express their sympathies, they say they cannot give him anything.

A depressed Sir Condy tells Thady that he wishes to see his own funeral, hopeful that it may be as grand an affair as Patrick O’Shaughlin’s. Thady helps Sir Condy arrange “a sham disorder,” where he pulls off a show of being mortally ill (82). A great throng of people attend the wake and it gets so noisy in the lodge’s two rooms that Sir Condy complains that he cannot hear the fine words said about him. Then Judy M’Quirk attends his wake and spreads the news that Isabella has been lying about being dead. Although Isabella was being dragged by the petticoat on falling out of a carriage, there is some speculation as to whether she is actually dead.

Jason arrives on the scene and “showers down golden guineas upon the bed” which amount to Sir Condy’s lawful property in the present moment (89). He says that with the 200 guineas and the third he means to add, Sir Condy should make over his entire estate to him. Sir Condy gathers up the golden guineas, ties them in a handkerchief, and signs Jason’s paper. Jason’s haste to conclude the business has been prompted by a report that it was likely that Lady Rackrent would not survive the night and he wanted to arrive at Sir Condy’s ahead of the little gossoon [errand boy] who would come with the news of her death. Judy is at the lodge and Thady suggests that she may stand a chance of becoming the new Lady Rackrent, if Sir Condy asks her to marry him. Judy says that she could do better because “what signifies it to be my lady Rackrent and no Castle?” (92). Thady realizes that she has been coming to the lodge in the hope of meeting Jason and recommending herself to him. She retorts that it’s unnatural for Thady to “‘not to wish your own son prefarred [sic] to another’” (93).

Then, following a bet that Sir Condy wins—by drinking from a horn without stopping, in the manner of his ancestor, Patrick—he contracts a severe fever.  Sickened by the sight of him, Judy refuses to nurse him and he dies with only Thady and Thady’s sister by his side. Sir Condy has a poor funeral. In the end, Isabella survives her accident, but is disfigured by the fall. She and Jason set about going to court over the jointure, which gives her a stake in Castle Rackrent after her estranged husband’s demise. Thady ends his tale with a statement supporting the authenticity of all the facts he has related.

An editor provides a postscript to Thady’s tale, saying that he could have readily made the “catastrophe of Sir Condy’s history more dramatic and more pathetic” but thought it better to “varnish” Thady’s plain tale instead of altering it beyond recognition (96). He hopes the English reader will learn about unfamiliar Irish habits through Thady. He then concludes by wondering if “it is a problem of difficult solution to determine, whether an Union will hasten or retard the amelioration of” Ireland (97). Perhaps, he speculates, British manufactures may take the place of “the few gentlemen of education” in Ireland, following the Union (97).