Personal sketches of his own times, Vol. 3 (of 3) — Themes and Context

A Memoirist's Apology for Haste

Barrington's preface is unusually candid about the speed of composition: the first two volumes were 'collected and composed' in nearly three months. He does not claim this as literary expertise but as 'some apology for the inaccuracies incidental to so hasty a performance.' This self-deprecation is characteristic of the volume's tone. The dedication further reveals that the third volume was written at Lord Stowell's express wish, after Stowell reported that the sketches 'had given very general satisfaction' and 'afforded him much amusement.' Barrington, now past seventy, offers this as 'the last and only souvenir' he can tender. These paratexts frame the work as a personal, almost conversational offering rather than a formal history.

The Sow That Overturned a Breakfast

The excerpted anecdote centers on a sow and her piglets invading a parlour breakfast. Barrington describes the sow with grotesque precision: 'small fiery blood-shot sunken eyes,' tusks 'like a boar's,' and an iron ring and hook in her nose. The piglets are called 'piggin riggins,' a dialect term that grounds the scene in Irish rural life. The sow, attracted by the 'savoury perfume' of the meal, enters, overturns the table, and traps two counsellors on a chest of drawers. The humour escalates when a piglet overturns a saucepan of boiling water, causing 'the most dreadful cries.' Barrington's voice is mock-heroic, comparing the sow's grunt to a trumpeter sounding 'to horse' and the piglet's yelp to a butcher's preliminary steps. The scene is a set-piece of comic misadventure, showcasing Barrington's eye for physical detail and his willingness to make himself the butt of the joke.

Catalog Subjects vs. Actual Content

The catalog subjects list 'Judges -- Ireland -- Biography' and 'Ireland -- Social life and customs -- 18th century' and '19th century.' Yet the excerpt contains no judges, no courtroom, no political events. Instead, it offers a domestic farce involving a sow, a breakfast, and two lawyers reduced to dancing on furniture. The dedication and preface are personal, not historical. This gap between catalog and content is instructive: Barrington's 'sketches' are less systematic biography than rambling memoir, heavy on anecdote and light on institutional analysis. Readers expecting a judicial chronicle will find instead a work that treats legal figures as characters in a comedy of manners. The volume's value lies in its informal record of manners, dialect, and the texture of Irish gentry life, not in any comprehensive account of the Irish bench.

Barrington's third volume rewards readers who enjoy digressive, self-deprecating memoir over structured history. The sow anecdote exemplifies his method: a small, vivid incident becomes a window into social hierarchy, domestic space, and the author's own comic persona. Approach this work as a cabinet of curiosities rather than a systematic record, and its pleasures—and its limitations—become clear.

That rainy afternoon, Barrington’s sow crashing the breakfast party made me chuckle at how dignity always topples into absurdity. Later, I found myself wondering about other voices left out of such memoirs. A quiet link appeared in my thoughts—Colored girls and boys' inspiring United States history and a heart to heart talk about white folks — Background and Themes—and the rain seemed to soften around its pages.