STORIES BY ENGLISH AUTHORS

IRELAND

THE GRIDIRON BY SAMUEL LOVERTHE EMERGENCY MEN BY GEORGE H. JESSOPA LOST RECRUIT BY JANE BARLOWTHE RIVAL DREAMERS BY JOHN BANIMNEAL MALONE BY WILLIAM CARLETONTHE BANSHEE ANONYMOUS

THE GRIDIRON

BY SAMUEL LOVER

A certain old gentleman in the west of Ireland, whose love of theridiculous quite equalled his taste for claret and fox-hunting, waswont, upon festive occasions, when opportunity offered, to amusehis friends by DRAWING OUT one of his servants, exceedingly fondof what he termed, his "thravels, " and in whom a good deal of whim, some queer stories, and, perhaps more than all, long and faithfulservices had established a right of loquacity. He was one of thosefew trusty and privileged domestics who, if his master unheedinglyuttered a rash thing in a fit of passion, would venture to set himright. If the squire said, "I'll turn that rascal off, " my friendPat would say, "Throth you won't, sir;" and Pat was always right, for if any altercation arose upon the "subject-matter in hand, "he was sure to throw in some good reason, either from formerservices--general good conduct--or the delinquent's "wife andchildren, " that always turned the scale. 

But I am digressing. On such merry meetings as I have alludedto, the master, after making certain "approaches, " as a militaryman would say, as the preparatory steps in laying siege to someextravaganza of his servant, might, perchance, assail Pat thus:"By the by, Sir John" (addressing a distinguished guest), "Pat hasa very curious story, which something you told me to-day remindsme of. You remember, Pat" (turning to the man, evidently pleasedat the notice thus paid to himself)--"you remember that queeradventure you had in France?"

"Throth I do, sir, " grins forth Pat. 

"What!" exclaims Sir John, in feigned surprise, "was Pat ever inFrance?"

"Indeed he was, " cries mine host; and Pat adds, "Ay, and farther, plase your honour. "

"I assure you, Sir John, " continues mine host, "Pat told me a storyonce that surprised me very much, respecting the ignorance of theFrench. "

"Indeed!" rejoined the baronet; "really, I always supposed theFrench to be a most accomplished people. "

"Throth, then, they're not, sir, " interrupts Pat. 

"Oh, by no means, " adds mine host, shaking his head emphatically. 

"I believe, Pat, 'twas when you were crossing the Atlantic?" saysthe master, turning to Pat with a seductive air, and leading intothe "full and true account" (for Pat had thought fit to visitNorth Amerikay, for "a raison he had, " in the autumn of the yearninety-eight). 

"Yes, sir, " says Pat, "the broad Atlantic"--a favourite phrase ofhis, which he gave with a brogue as broad, almost, as the Atlanticitself. 

"It was the time I was lost in crassin' the broad Atlantic, a-comin'home, " began Pat, decoyed into the recital; "whin the winds beganto blow, and the saw to rowl, that you'd think the Colleen Dhas(that was her name) would not have a mast left but what would rowlout of her. 

"Well, sure enough, the masts went by the hoard, at last, and thepumps were choked (divil choke them for that same), and av coorsethe wather gained an us; and, throth, to be filled with wather isneither good for man or baste; and she was sinkin' fast, settlin'down, as the sailors call it; and, faith, I never was good at settlin'down in my life, and I liked it then less nor ever. Accordinglywe prepared for the worst, and put out the boot, and got a sack o'bishkits and a cask o' pork and a kag o' wather and a thrifle o'rum aboord, and any other little matthers we could think iv in themortial hurry we wor in--and, faith, there was no time to be lost, for, my darlint, the Colleen Dhas went down like a lump o' leadafore we wor many sthrokes o' the oar away from her. 

"Well, we dhrifted away all that night, and next mornin' we putup a blanket an the end av a pole as well as we could, and then wesailed illegant; for we darn't show a stitch o' canvas the nightbefore, bekase it was blowin' like bloody murther, savin' yourpresence, and sure it's the wondher of the worid we worn't swally'dalive by the ragin' sae. 

"Well, away we wint, for more nor a week, and nothin' before our twogood-lookin' eyes but the canophy iv heaven and the wide ocean--thebroad Atlantic; not a thing was to be seen but the sae and the sky;and though the sae and the sky is mighty purty things in themselves, throth, they're no great things when you've nothin' else to lookat for a week together; and the barest rock in the world, so itwas land, would be more welkim. And then, soon enough, throth, ourprovisions began to run low, the bishkits and the wather and therum--throth, THAT was gone first of all--God help uz!--and oh! itwas thin that starvation began to stare us in the face. 'O murther, murther, Captain darlint, ' says I, 'I wish we could land anywhere, 'says I. 

"'More power to your elbow, Paddy, my boy, ' says he, 'for sitch agood wish, and, throth, it's myself wishes the same. '

"'Och, ' says I, 'that it may plase you, sweet queen iv heaven, supposing it was only a DISSOLUTE island, ' says I, 'inhabited widTurks, sure they wouldn't be such bad Chrishthans as to refuse usa bit and a sup. '

"'Whisht, whisht, Paddy, ' says the captain, 'don't be talking badof any one, ' says he; 'you don't know how soon you may want a goodword put in for yourself, if you should be called to quarthers inth' other world all of a suddint, " says he. 

"'Thrue for you, Captain darlint, ' says I--I called him darlint, and made free with him, you see, bekase disthress makes usall equal--'thrue for you, Captain jewel--God betune uz and harm, I own no man any spite'--and, throth, that was only thruth. Well, the last bishkit was sarved out, and, by gor, the WATHER ITSELFwas all gone at last, and we passed the night mighty cowld. Well, at the brake o' day the sun riz most beautifully out o' the waves, that was as bright as silver and as clear as chrystal. But it wasonly the more cruel upon us, for we wor beginnin' to feel TERRIBLEhungry; when all at wanst I thought I spied the land. By gor, Ithought I felt my heart up in my throat in a minit, and 'Thunderan' turf, Captain, ' says I, 'look to leeward, ' says I. 

"'What for?' says he. 

"'I think I see the land, ' says I. 

"So hes ups with his bring-'em-near (that's what the sailors calla spy-glass, sir), and looks out, and, sure enough, it was. 

"'Hurrah!' says he, 'we're all right now; pull away, my boys, ' sayshe. 

"'Take care you're not mistaken, ' says I; 'maybe it's only afog-bank, Captain darlint, ' says I. 

"'Oh no, ' says he; 'it's the land in airnest. '

"'Oh, then, whereaboats in the wide world are we, Captain?' saysI; 'maybe it id be in ROOSIA, or PROOSIA, the Garmant Oceant, ' saysI. 

"'Tut, you fool, ' says he, for he had that consaited way wid him, thinkin' himself cleverer nor any one else--'tut, you fool, ' sayshe, 'that's FRANCE, ' says he. 

"'Tare an ouns, ' says I, 'do you tell me so? and how do you knowit's France it is, Captain dear?' says I. 

"'Bekase this is the Bay o' Bishky we're in now, ' says he. 

"'Throth, I was thinkin' so myself, ' says I, 'by the rowl it has;for I often heerd av it in regard of that same; and, throth, thelikes av it I never seen before nor since, and, with the help ofGod, never will. '

"Well, with that, my heart began to grow light; and when I seen mylife was safe, I began to grow twice hungrier nor ever; so says I, 'Captain jewel, I wish we had a gridiron. '

"'Why, then, ' says he, 'thunder an' turf, ' says he, 'what puts agridiron into your head?'

"'Bekase I'm starvin' with the hunger, ' says I. 

"'And, sure, bad luck to you, ' says he, 'you couldn't eat a gridiron, 'says he, 'barrin' you were a PELICAN O' THE WILDHERNESS, ' says he. 

"'Ate a gridiron!' says I. 'Och, in throth, I'm not such a gommochall out as that, anyhow. But, sure, if we had a gridiron we coulddress a beefstake, ' says I. 

"'Arrah! but where's the beefstake?' says he. 

"'Sure, couldn't we cut a slice aff the pork?' says I. 

"'By gor, I never thought o' that, ' says the captain. 'You're aclever fellow, Paddy, ' says he, laughin'. 

"'Oh, there's many a true word said in joke, ' says I. 

"'Thrue for you, Paddy, ' says he. 

"'Well, then, ' says I, 'if you put me ashore there beyant (for wewere nearin' the land all the time), 'and, sure, I can ax them forto lind me the loan of a gridiron, ' says I. 

"'Oh, by gor, the butther's comin' out o' the stirabout in airnestnow, ' says he; 'you gommoch, ' says he, 'sure I told you beforethat's France--and, sure, they're all furriners there, ' says thecaptain. 

"'Well, says I, 'and how do you know but I'm as good a furrinermyself as any o' thim?'

"'What do you mane?' says he. 

"'I mane, ' says I, 'what I towld you, that I'm as good a furrinermyself as any o thim. '

"'Make me sinsible, ' says he. 

"'By dad, maybe that's more nor me, or greater nor me, could do, 'says I; and we all began to laugh at him, for I thought I wouldpay him off for his bit o' consait about the Garmant Oceant. 

"'Lave off your humbuggin', ' says he, 'I bid you, and tell me whatit is you mane at all at all. '

"'Parly voo frongsay?' says I. 

"'Oh, your humble sarvant, ' says he; 'why, by gor, you're a scholar, Paddy. '

"'Thruth, you may say that, ' says I. 

"'Why, you're a clever fellow, Paddy, ' says the captain, jeerin'like. 

"'You're not the first that said that, ' says I, 'whether you jokeor no. '

"'Oh, but I'm in airnest, ' says the captain; 'and do you tell me, Paddy, ' says he, 'that you spake Frinch?'

"'Parly voo frongsay?' says I. 

"'By gor, that bangs Banagher, and all the world knows Banagherbangs the divil. I never met the likes o' you, Paddy, ' says he. 'Pull away, boys, and put Paddy ashore, and maybe we won't get agood bellyful before long. '

"So, with that, it wos no sooner said nor done. They pulled away, and got close into shore in less than no time, and run the boatup in a little creek; and a beautiful creek it was, with a lovelywhite sthrand--an illegant place for ladies to bathe in the summer;and out I got; and it's stiff enough in the limbs I was, aftherbein' cramped up in the boat, and perished with the cowld andhunger; but I conthrived to scramble on, one way or t' other, tow'rda little bit iv a wood that was close to the shore, and the smokecurlin' out iv it, quite timptin' like. 

"'By the powdhers o' war, I'm all right, ' says I; 'there's a housethere. ' And, sure enough, there was, and a parcel of men, women, and childher, ating their dinner round a table, quite convanient. And so I wint up to the door, and I thought I'd be very civil tothem, as I heerd the Frinch was always mighty p'lite intirely, andI thought I'd show them I knew what good manners was. 

"So I took aff my hat, and, making a low bow, says I, 'God saveall here, ' says I. 

"Well, to be sure, they all stapt ating at wanst, and began tostare at me, and, faith, they almost looked me out of countenance;and I thought to myself, it was not good manners at all, more betokenfrom furriners which they call so mighty p'lite. But I never mindedthat, in regard o' wantin' the gridiron; and so says I, 'I beg yourpardon, ' says I, 'for the liberty I take, but it's only bein' indisthress in regard of ating, ' says I, 'that I made bowld to throubleyez, and if you could lind me the loan of a gridiron, ' says I, 'I'dbe intirely obleeged to ye. '

"By gor, they all stared at me twice worse nor before, and withthat, says I (knowing what was in their minds), 'Indeed, it's thruefor you, ' says I. 'I'm tatthered to pieces, and God knows I lookquare enough; but it's by raison of the storm, ' says I, 'whichdhruv us ashore here below, and we're all starvin', ' says I. 

"So then they began to look at each other again; and myself seeingat once dirty thoughts was in their heads, and that they tuk mefor a poor beggar coming to crave charity, with that says I, 'Oh, not at all, ' says I, 'by no manes--we have plenty of mate ourselvesthere below, and we'll dhress it, ' says I, 'if you would be plasedto lind us the loan of a gridiron, ' says I, makin' a low bow. 

"Well, sir, with that, throth, they stared at me twice worsenor ever, and, faith, I began to think that maybe the captain waswrong, and that it was not France at all at all; and so says I, 'Ibeg pardon, sir, ' says I to a fine ould man, with a head of hairas white as silver; 'maybe I'm under a mistake, ' says I, 'but Ithought I was in France, sir; aren't you furriners?' says I. 'Parlyvoo frongsay?'

"'We, munseer, ' says he. 

"'Then would you lind me the loan of a gridiron, ' says I, 'if youplase?'

"Oh, it was thin that they stared at me as if I had seven heads;and, faith, myself began to feel flushed like and onaisy; andso says I, makin' a bow and scrape ag'in, 'I know it's a libertyI take, sir, ' says I, 'but it's only in the regard of bein' castaway; and if you plase, sir, ' says I, 'parly voo frongsay?'

"'We, munseer, ' says he, mighty sharp. 

"'Then would you lind me the loan of a gridiron?' says I, 'andyou'll obleege me. '

"Well, sir, the ould chap began to munseer me; but the divil a bitof a gridiron he'd gi' me; and so I began to think they wor allneygars, for all their fine manners; and, throth, my blood begunto rise, and says I, 'By my sowl, if it was you was in disthress, 'says I, 'and if it was to ould Ireland you kem, it's not only thegridiron they'd give you, if you axed it, but something to put anit, too, and the drop o' dhrink into the bargain, and cead milefailte. '

"Well, the word cead mile failte seemed to sthreck his heart, and the ould chap cocked his ear, and so I thought I'd give himanother offer, and make him sinsible at last; and so says I, wanstmore, quite slow, that he might understand, 'Parly--voo--frongsay, munseer?'

"'We, munseer, ' says he. 

"'Then lind me the loan of a gridiron, ' says I, 'and bad scram toyou. '

"Well, bad win to the bit of it he'd gi' me, and the ould chap beginsbowin' and scrapin', and said something or other about a long tongs. 

[Footnote: Some mystification of Paddy's touching the Frenchn'tends. ]

"'Phoo!--the divil swape yourself and your tongs, ' says I; 'I don'twant a tongs at all at all; but can't you listen to raison?' saysI. 'Parly voo frongsay?'

"'We, munseer. '

"'Then lind me the loan of a gridiron, ' says I, 'and howld yourprate. '

"Well, what would you think, but he shook his old noddle as much asto say he wouldn't; and so says I, 'Bad cess to the likes o' thatI ever seen! Throth, if you wor in my counthry, it's not that awaythey'd use you. The curse o' the crows an you, you ould sinner, 'says I; 'the divil a longer i'll darken your door. '

"So he seen I was vexed; and I thought, as I was turnin' away, Iseen him begin to relint, and that his conscience throubled him;and says I, turnin' back, 'Well, I'll give you one chance more, you ould thief. Are you a Chrishthan at all? Are you a furriner, 'says I, ' that all the world calls so p'lite? Bad luck to you, doyou understand your own language? Parly voo frongsay?' says I. 

"'We, munseer, ' says he. 

"'Then, thunder an' turf, ' says I, 'will you lind me the loan ofa gridiron?'

"Well, sir, the divil resa've the bit of it he'd gi' me; andso, with that, 'The curse o' the hungry an you, you ould neygarlyvillain, ' says I; 'the back o' my hand and the sowl o' my foot toyou, that you may want a gridiron yourself yit, ' says I. And withthat I left them there, sir, and kem away; and, in throth, it'soften sense that I thought that it was remarkable. "

THE EMERGENCY MEN

BY GEORGE H. JESSOP

The fourth morning after his arrival in Dublin, Mr. Harold Hayes, of New York, entered the breakfast-room of the Shelbourne Hotel ina very bad humour. He was sick of the city, of the people, and ofhis own company. Before leaving London he had written to his friend, Jack Connolly, that he was coming to Ireland, and he had expectedto find a reply at the Shelbourne. For three days he had waitedin vain, and it was partly, at least, on Jack's account that Mr. Hayes was in Ireland at all. When Jack sailed from New York he hadbound Harold by a solemn promise to spend a few weeks at Lisnahoeon his next visit to Europe. Miss Connelly, who had accompanied herbrother on his American tour, had echoed and indorsed the invitation. 

Harold had naturally expected to find at the hotel a letter urginghim to take the first train for the south. He had seen a greatdeal of the Connellys during their stay in the United States, andJack and he had become firm friends. He had crossed at this unusualseason mainly on Jack's account--on Jack's account and his sister's;so it was little wonder if the young man considered himself illused. He felt that he had been lured across the Irish Channel--acrossthe Atlantic Ocean itself--on false pretences. 

But in a moment the cloud lifted from his brow, a quick smile stirredunder his yellow moustache, and his eyes brightened, for a waiterhanded him a letter. It lay, address uppermost, on the salver, andbore the Ballydoon postmark, and the handwriting was the disjointedscrawl which he had often ridiculed, but now welcomed as JackConnolly's. 

This is what Hayes read as he sipped his coffee:

LISNAHOE, December 23d. 

MY DEAR HAROLD: Home I come from Ballinasloe yesterday, and findyour letter, the best part of a week old, kicking about amongthe bills and notices of meets that make the biggest end of mycorrespondence. You must be destroyed entirely, my poor fellow, ifyou've been three days in dear dirty Dublin, and you not knowinga soul in it. Come down at once, and you'll find a hearty welcomehere if you won't find much else. I don't see why you couldn'thave come anyhow, without waiting to write; but you were alwaysso confoundedly ceremonious. We're rather at sixes and sevens, forthe governor's got "in howlts" with his tenants and we're boycotted. It's not bad fun when you're used to it, but a trifle inconvenientin certain small ways. Let me know what train you take and I'llmeet you at the station. You must be here for Christmas Day anyhow. Polly sends her regards, and says she knew the letter was from you, and she came near opening it. I'm sure I wish she had, and answeredit, for I'm a poor fist at a letter. 

Yours truly, JACK CONNOLLY. 

The first available train carried Harold southward. On the way heread the letter again. The notion of entering a boycotted householdamused and pleased him. He had never been in Ireland before, and hewas quite willing that his first visit should be well spiced withthe national flavour. Of course he had his views on the Irishquestion. Every American newspaper reader is cheerfully satisfiedwith the conviction that the Celtic race on its native sod has noreal faults. A constitutional antipathy to rent may exist, but thatis a national foible which, owing doubtless to some peculiarity ofthe climate, is almost praiseworthy in Ireland, though elsewhereregarded as hardly respectable. At any rate, with the consciousnessthat he was about to come face to face with the much-talked-ofboycott, Harold's spirits rose, and as he read Polly Connolly'smessage they rose still higher. He was a lively young fellow, andfond of excitement. And at one time, as he recalled with a smileand a sigh, he had been almost fond of Polly Connolly. 

When he alighted at the station--a small place in Tipperary--the duskof the early winter evening was closing in, and Harold recollectedthat his prompt departure from Dublin had prevented him fromapprising Jack of his movements. Of course there would be no trapfrom Lisnahoe to meet this train, but that mattered little. Halfa dozen hack-drivers were already extolling the merits of theirvarious conveyances, and imploring his patronage. 

Selecting the best-looking car, he swung himself into his seat, while the "jarvey" hoisted his portmanteau on the other side. 

"Where to, yer honour?" inquired the latter, climbing to his place. 

"To Lisnahoe House, " answered Hayes. 

"Where?"

This question was asked with a vehemence that startled the youngAmerican. 

"Lisnahoe. Don't you know the way?" he replied. 

"In troth an' I do. Is it Connolly's?"

"Yes, " answered Harold. "Drive on, my good fellow; it's growinglate. "

The man's only answer was to spring from his seat and seize Harold'sportmanteau, which he deposited on the road with no gentle hand. 

"What do you mean?" cried the young man, indignantly. 

"I mane that ye'd betther come down out o' that afore I make ye. "

Harold was on the ground in a moment and approached the man withclinched fists and flashing eyes. 

"How dare you, you scoundrel! Will you drive me to Lisnahoe or willyou not?"

"The divil a fut, " answered the fellow, sullenly. 

Hayes controlled his anger by an effort. There was nothing to begained by a row with the man. He turned to another driver. 

"Pick up that portmanteau. Drive me out to Mr. Connolly's. I'llpay double fare. "

But they all with one consent, like the guests in the parable, began to make excuse. One man's horse was lame, another's car wasbroken down; the services of a third had been "bespoke. " Few wereas frank as the man first engaged, but all were prompt with theobvious lies, scarcely less aggravating than actual rudeness. Thestation-master appeared, and attempted to use his influence in thetraveller's behalf, but he effected nothing. 

"You'll have to walk, sir, " said the official, civilly. "I'll keepyour portmanteau here till Mr. Connolly sends for it. " And hecarried the luggage back into the station. 

"How far is it to Mr. Connolly's?" Harold inquired of a raggedurchin who had strolled up with several companions. 

"Fish an' find out, " answered the youngster, with a grin. 

"We'll tache them to be sendin' Emergency men down here, " saidanother. 

The New-Yorker was fast losing patience. 

"This is Irish hospitality and native courtesy, " he remarked, bitterly. "Will any one tell me the road I am to follow?"

"Folly yer nose, " a voice shouted; and there was a general laugh, in the midst of which the station-master reappeared. 

He pointed out the way, and Harold trudged off to accomplish, as best he might, five Irish miles over miry highways and bywaysthrough the darkness of the December evening. 

This was the young American's first practical experience ofboycotting. 

It was nearly seven o'clock when, tired and mud-bespattered, hereached Lisnahoe; but the warmth of his reception there went far tobanish all recollection of the discomforts of his solitary tramp. A hearty hand-clasp from Jack, a frank and smiling greeting fromPolly (she looked handsomer than ever, Harold thought, with herlustrous black hair and soft, dark-gray eyes), put him at his easeat once. Then came introductions to the rest of the family. Mr. Connolly, stout and white-haired, bade him welcome in a voicewhich owned more than a touch of Tipperary brogue. Mrs. Connolly, florid and good-humoured, was very solicitous for his comfort. Thechildren confused him at first. There were so many of them, of allsizes, that Hayes abandoned for the present any attempt to distinguishthem by name. There was a tall lad of twenty or thereabouts, --afaithful copy of his elder brother Jack, --who was addressed asDick, and a pretty, fair-haired girl of seventeen, whom, as Polly'ssister, Harold was prepared to like at once. She was Agnes. Afterthese came a long array, --no less than nine more, --ending witha sturdy little chap of three, whom Polly presently picked up andcarried off to bed. Mr. Connolly, of Lisnahoe, could boast of afull quiver. 

There was a general chorus of laughter as Harold related hisexperience at the railway-station. The Connollys had rested forseveral days under the ban of the most rigid boycott, and had becomeused to small discomforts. They faced the situation bravely, andturned all such petty troubles into jest; but the American wassorely disquieted to learn that there was only one servant in thehouse--an old man who for many years had blacked boots and cleanedknives for the family, and who had refused to crouch to heel underthe lash of the boycott. 

Harold stammered an apology for his unseasonable visit, but Jackcut him short. 

"Nonsense, man; the more the merrier. We're glad to have you, andif you can rough it a bit you won't find it half bad fun. "

"Oh, I don't mind, I'm sure, " said Harold; "only I'm afraid you'drather have your house to yourselves at such a time as this. "

"Not we. Why, we expect some Emergency men down here in a fewdays. We'll treat you as the advance guard; we'll set you to workand give you your grub the same as an Emergency man. "

"What is an Emergency man?" inquired Harold. "Those Chesterfieldiandrivers at the station seemed to think it was the worst name theycould call me. "

A hearty laugh went round the circle. 

"If they took ye for an Emergency man, it's small wonder they werenone too swate on ye, " observed Mr. Connolly. 

"But what does it mean?" asked the New-Yorker. 

"Well, " began the old gentleman, "there's good and bad in thisworld of ours. When tenants kick and labourers clare out, an' aboycott's put on a man, they'd lave yer cattle to die an' yer cropsto rot for all they care. It's what they want. Well, there happensto be a few dacent people left in Ireland yet, and they have got upan organization they call the Emergency men; they go to any partof the country and help out people that have been boycotted throughno fault of their own--plough their fields or reap their oats ordig their potatoes, an' generally knock the legs out from under theboycott. It stands to reason that the blackguards in these partshate an Emergency man as the divil hates holy water; but ye maytake it as a compliment that ye were mistook for one, for all that. "

Here Dick thrust his head into the door of the large library, inwhich the party was assembled. 

"Dinner is served, my lords and ladies, " he cried; and there wasa general movement toward the dining-room. 

"No ceremony here, my boy, " laughed Jack, as he led Harold acrossthe hall. "I'll be your cavalier and show you the way. The girlsare in the kitchen, I suppose. "

But Miss Connolly and Agnes were already in the dining-room, andthe party gathered round the well-spread board and proceeded to dofull justice to the good things thereon. The meal was more likea picnic than a set dinner. Old Peter Dwyer, the last remainingretainer, had never attended at table, so he confined himself tokitchen duties, while the young Connollys waited on themselves andon each other. A certain little maid, whom Harold by this time hadidentified as Bella, devoted herself to the stranger, and tookcare that neither his glass nor his plate should be empty. A glanceof approval, which he intercepted on its way from Miss Connolly toher little sister, told Harold that Bella had been given a chargeconcerning him, and he appreciated the attention none the less onthat account, while he ate his dinner with the agreeable confidencethat it had been prepared by Miss Polly's own fair hands. 

Everything at table was abundant and good of its kind, and conversationwas alert and merry, as it is apt to be in a large family party. Sofar, the boycott seemed to have anything but a depressing effect, though Harold could not help smiling as he realised how it would havecrushed to powder more than one estimable family of his acquaintance. 

After dinner Jack rose, saying that he must go round to the stablesand bed down the horses for the night. Harold accompanied him, andacquitted himself very well with a pitchfork, considering that hehad little experience with such an implement. He had gone with acouple of the younger boys to chop turnips for certain cattle whichwere being fattened for the market. 

"How did you come to be boycotted?" inquired Harold, with somecuriosity, as soon as he found himself alone with Jack. 

"Oh, it doesn't take much talent to accomplish that nowadays, "answered the young Irishman, with a laugh. "In the first place, thegovernor has a habit of asking for his rent, which is an unpopularproceeding at the best of times. In the second place, I bought halfa dozen bullocks from a boycotted farmer out Limerick way. "

"And is that all?" asked Harold, in astonishment. Notwithstandinghis regard for his friend, he had never doubted that there must havebeen some appalling piece of persecution to justify this determinedostracism. 

"All!" echoed Jack, laughing. "You don't know much of Ireland, myboy, or you wouldn't ask that question. We bought cattle that hadbeen raised by a farmer on land from which a defaulting tenant hadbeen evicted. Men have been shot in these parts for less than that. "

"Pleasant state of affairs, " remarked the New-Yorker. 

"I don't much care, " Jack went on, lightly. "We're promised acouple of Emergency men from Ulster in a few days, and that willtake the weight of the work off our hands. It isn't as if it werea busy time. No crops to be saved in winter, you see, and no farmwork except stall-feeding the cattle. That can't wait. "

"But your sisters--all the work of that big house--" began Harold, who was thinking of Polly. 

"We expect two Protestant girls down from Belfast to-morrow. That'llbe all right. We get all our grub from Dublin, --they won't sell usanything in Ballydoon, --and we mean to keep on doing so, boycott orno boycott. We have been about the best customers to the shopkeepersround here, and it'll come near ruining the town--and serve themright, " the young man added, with the first touch of bitterness hehad displayed in speaking of the persecution of his family. 

By next day the situation had improved. A couple of servant-girlsarrived from the north. They were expected, and accordingly Dickwas on hand with the jaunting-car to meet them and drive them fromthe station. The Emergency men had not yet appeared, so Jack andsuch of his brothers as were old enough to be of use were keptpretty busy round the place. Harold had wished to return to Englandand postpone his visit till a more convenient time, but to this noone would listen. He made no trouble; he was not a bit in the way;in fact, he was a great help. So said they all, and the youngNew-Yorker was quite willing to believe them. 

He did occasionally offer assistance in stable or farm-yard, buthe much preferred to spend his time rambling over the old place, admiring the lawns, the woods, the gardens, all strangely silentand deserted now. Miss Connolly was often his companion. Theimportation from Belfast relieved her of some of the pressure ofhousehold cares, and since her brothers were fully occupied, itdevolved upon her to play host as well as hostess, and point outto the stranger the various charms of Lisnahoe. 

This suited Harold exactly. He usually carried a gun and sometimesshot a rabbit or a wood-pigeon, but generally he was content tolisten to Polly's lively conversation, and gaze into the depths ofher eyes, wondering why they looked darker and softer here under theshadow of her native woods than they had ever seemed in the glareand dazzle of a New York ball-room. Harold Hayes was falling inlove--falling consciously, yet without a struggle. He was beginningto realise that life could have nothing better in store for himthan this tall, graceful girl, in her becoming sealskin cap andjacket, whose little feet, so stoutly and serviceably shod, keptpace with his own over so many miles of pleasant rambles. 

One day--it was the last of the old year--Miss Connolly and Haroldwere strolling along a path on which the wintry sunshine was tracingfantastic patterns as it streamed through the naked branches ofthe giant beech-trees. The young man had a gun on his shoulder, but he was paying little attention to the nimble rabbits that nowand then frisked across the road. He was thinking, and thinkingdeeply. 

He could not hope for many more such quiet walks with his faircompanion. She would soon have more efficient chaperons than thechildren, who often made a pretence of accompanying them, but invariablydashed off, disdainful of the sober pace of their elders. Beforelong--next day probably--he would be handed over to the tendermercies of Jack, who had constantly lamented the occupations thatprevented his paying proper attention to his guest. The heir ofLisnahoe had promised to show the young stranger some "real goodsport" as soon as other duties would permit. That time was closeat hand now. The Emergency men had been at work for several days;they were thoroughly at home in their duties; besides, the fatcattle would be finished very shortly and sent off to be sold inDublin. Jack had announced his intention of stealing a holiday onthe morrow, and taking Hayes to a certain famous "snipe bottom, "when the game was, to use Dick's expression, "as thick as plums inone of Polly's puddings. "

It was hard to guess then they might have such another rumble, andHarold had much to say to the girl at his side; and yet, for thelife of him, he could not utter the words that were trembling onhis lips. 

"I don't believe you care much for shooting, Mr. Hayes. "

A rabbit loped slowly across die road not twenty yards from thegun, but Harold had not noticed it. He roused himself with a start, however, at the sound of his companion's voice. 

"Oh yes, I do, sometimes, " he answered, glancing alertly to bothsides of the road; but no game was in sight for the moment. 

"If this frost should break up, you may have some hunting, " pursuedMiss Connolly. "I'm afraid you're having an awfully stupid time. "

Harold interposed an eager denial. 

"Oh yes, you must be, " insisted the young lady; "but Jack will findmore time now, and if we have a thaw you will have a day with thehounds. Are you fond of hunting?"

"I am very fond of riding, but I have never hunted, " answered theNew-Yorker. 

"Just like me. I am never so happy as when I am on horseback, butmamma won't let me ride to hounds. She says she does not approveof ladies on the field. It is traditional, I suppose, that everymistress of Lisnahoe should oppose hunting. "

"Indeed, why so?" inquired Harold. 

"Why, don't you know?" asked the girl. "Has nobody told you ourfamily ghost-story?"

"No one as yet, " answered Hayes. 

"Then mine be the pleasing task; and there is a peculiar fitnessin your hearing it just now, for to-morrow will be New-Year's Day. "

Harold failed to see the applicability of the date, but he made noobservation, and Miss Connolly went on. 

"Ever so many years ago this place belonged to an ancestor of minewho was devoted to field-sports of all kinds. He lived for nothingelse, people thought, but suddenly he surprised all the world bygetting married. "

Harold thought that if her remote grandmother had chanced toresemble the fair young girl at his side, there was a good excusefor the sportsman; but he held his tongue. 

"The bride was exacting--or perhaps she was only timid. At anyrate, she used her influence to wean her husband from his outdoorpursuits--especially hunting. He must have been very much in lovewith her, for she succeeded, and he promised to give it all up--afterone day more. It seems that he could not get out of this last run. The meet was on the lawn; the hunt breakfast was to be at LisnahoeHouse. In short, it was an affair that could neither be alterednor postponed. 

"This meet, " continued Polly, "was on New-Year's Day. There wasa great gathering, and after breakfast the gentlemen came out andmounted at the door; the hounds were grouped on the lawn; it musthave been a beautiful sight. "

"It must, indeed, " assented Harold. 

"Well, this old Mr. Connolly--but you must understand that he wasnot old at all, only all this happened so long ago--he mounted hishorse, and his wife came out on the step to bid him good-bye, andto remind him of his promise that this should be his last hunt. And so it was, poor fellow; for while she was standing talkingto him, a gust of wind came and blew part of her dress right intothe horse's face. Mr. Connolly was riding a very spirited animal. It reared up and fell back on him, killing him on the spot. "

"How horrible!" exclaimed Harold. 

"Wait! The shock to the young wife was so great that she died thenext day. "

"The poor girl!"

"Don't waste your sympathy. It was all very long ago, and perhapsit never happened at all. However, the curious part of the storyis to come. Every one that had been present at that meet--men, dogs, horses--everything died within the year. "

"To the ruin of the local insurance companies?" remarked Harold, with a smile. 

"You needn't laugh. They did. And next New-Year's night, betweentwelve and one o'clock, the whole hunt passed through the place, and they have kept on doing it every New-Year's night since. "

"A most interesting and elaborate ghost-story, " said Harold. "Pray, Miss Connolly, may I ask if you yourself have seen the phantomhunt?"

"No one has ever done that, " replied Polly, "but when there ismoonlight they say the shadows can be seen passing over the grass, and any New-Year's night you may hear the huntsman's horn. "

"I should like amazingly to hear it, " replied the young man. "Haveyou ever heard this horn?"

"I have heard A horn, " the girl answered, with some reluctance. 

"On New-Year's night between twelve and one?" he pursued. 

"Of course--but I can't swear it was blown by a ghost. My brothersor some one may have been playing tricks. You can sit up to-nightand listen for yourself if you want. "

"Nothing I should like better, " exclaimed Harold. "Will you sit uptoo?"

"Oh yes. We always wait to see the Old Year out and the New Yearin. Come, Mr. Hayes, it's almost luncheon-time, " she added, glancingat her watch; and they turned back toward the house, which was justvisible through the leafless trees. 

Harold walked at her side in silence. He had heard a ghost-story, but the words he had hoped to speak that day were still unuttered. 

Loud were the pleadings, when the little ones' bedtime came, thatthey might be allowed to sit up to see the Old Year die; but Mrs. Connolly was inexorable. The very young ones were sent off to bedat their usual hour. 

Cards and music passed the time pleasantly till the clock was almoston the stroke of twelve. Then wine was brought in, and healthswere drunk, and warm, cheerful wishes were uttered, invoking allthe blessings that the New Year might have in store. Hands wereclasped and kisses were exchanged. Harold would willingly have beenincluded in this last ceremony, but that might not be. However, hecould and did press Polly's hand very warmly, and the earnestnessof the wishes he breathed in her ear called a bright colour to hercheek. Then came good-night, and the young American's heart grewstrangely soft when he found himself included in Mrs. Connolly'smotherly blessing. He thought he had never seen a happier, a moreunited family. 

The party was breaking up; some had retired; others were standing, bedroom candlesticks in their hands, exchanging a last word, whensuddenly, out of the silence of the night, the melodious notesof a huntsman's horn echoed through the room. Harold recalled thelegend, and paused at the door, mute and wondering. 

Jack and his father exchanged glances. 

"Now which of you's tryin' to humbug us this year?" asked the oldman, laughing, while Jack looked round and proceeded, as he said, to "count noses. "

This was a useless attempt, for half the party that had sat up towait for the New Year had already disappeared. 

Dick sprang to the window and threw it open, but the night wascloudy and dark. 

Again came the notes of the horn, floating in through the openwindow, and almost at the same moment there was a sound of hoofscrunching the gravel of the drive as a dozen or more animals sweptpast at wild gallop. 

"This is past a joke, " cried Jack. "I never heard of the old huntmaterializing in any such way as this. "

They rushed to the front door--Jack, Mr. Connolly, all of them. Harold reached it first. Wrenching it open, he stood on the step, while the others crowded about him and peered out into the night. Only darkness, rendered mirker by the lights in the hall; and fromthe distance, fainter now, came the measured beat of the gallopinghoofs. 

No other sound? Yes, a long-drawn, quivering, piteous sigh; and astheir eyes grew more accustomed to the night, out of the darknesssomething white shaped itself--something prone and helpless, lying on the gravel beneath the lowest step. They did not stop tospeculate as to what it might be. With a single impulse, Jack andHarold sprang down, and between them they carried back into thehall the inanimate body of Polly Connolly. 

Her eyes were closed and her face was as white as the muslin dressshe wore. Clutched in her right hand was a hunting-horn belongingto Dick. It was evident that the girl had stolen out unobserved toreproduce--perhaps for the visitor's benefit--the legendary notesof the phantom huntsman. This was a favorite joke among the youngConnollys, and scarcely a New-Year's night passed that it was notpractised by one or other of the large family; but what had occurredto-night? Whence came those galloping hoofs, and what was theexplanation of Polly's condition?

The swoon quickly yielded to the usual remedies, but even when sherevived it was some time before the girl could speak intelligibly. Her voice was broken by hysterical sobs; she trembled in everylimb. It was evident that her nerves had received a severe shock. 

While the others were occupied with Polly, Dick had stepped out onthe gravel sweep, where he was endeavouring, by close examination, to discover some clue to the puzzle. Suddenly he ran back into thehouse. 

"Something's on fire!" he cried. "I believe it's the yard. "

They all pressed to the open door--all except Mrs. Connolly, whostill busied herself with her daughter, and Harold, whose soleinterest was centred in the girl he loved. 

Above a fringe of shrubbery which masked the farm-yard, a red glowlit up the sky. It was evident the buildings were on fire. Andeven while they looked a man, half dressed, panting, smoke-stained, dashed up the steps. It was Tom Neil, one of the Emergency men. 

These men slept in the yard, in the quarters vacated by the desertingcoachman. In a few breathless words the big, raw-boned Ulstermantold the story of the last half-hour. 

He and his comrade Fergus had been awakened by suspicious soundsin the yard. Descending, they had found the cattle-shed in flames. Neil had forced his way in and had liberated and driven out theterrified bullocks. The poor animals, wild with terror, had burstfrom the yard and galloped off in the direction of the house. Thisaccounted for the trampling hoofs that had swept across the lawn, but scarcely for Polly's terrified condition. A country-bred girllike Miss Connolly would not lose her wits over the spectacleof a dozen fat oxen broken loose from their stalls. Had the barnpurposely burned, and had the girl fallen in with the retreatingincendiaries?

It seemed likely. No one there doubted the origin of the fire, andMr. Connolly expressed the general feeling as he shook his headand murmered:

"I mistrusted that they wouldn't let us get them cattle out o' thecountry without some trouble. "

"But where is Fergus?" demanded Jack, suddenly. 

"Isn't he here?" asked the Ulsterman. "When we seen the fire hestarted up to the big house to give the alarm, while I turned toto save the bullocks. "

"No, he never came to the house, " answered Jack, and there was anadded gravity in his manner as he turned to his brother. 

"Get a lantern, Dick. This thing must be looked into at once. "

While the boy went in search of a light, Mr. Connolly attempted toobtain from his daughter a connected statement of what had happenedand how much she had seen; but she was in no condition to answerquestions. The poor girl could only sob and moan and cover her facewith her hands, while convulsive tremblings shook her slight figure. 

"Oh, don't ask me, papa; don't speak to me about it. It wasdreadful--dreadful. I saw it all. "

This was all they could gain from her. 

"Don't thrubble the poor young lady, " interposed old Peter, compassionately. "Sure, the heart's put acrass in her wid thefright. Lave her be till mornin'. "

There seemed nothing else to be done, so Polly was left in chargeof her mother and sister, while the men, headed by Dick, who carrieda lantern, set out to examine the grounds. 

There was no trace of Fergus between the house and the farm-yard. The lawn was much cut up by the cattle, for the frost had turned torain early in the evening, and a rapid thaw was in progress. Theground was quite soft on the surface, and it was carefully scrutinisedfor traces of footsteps, but nothing could be distinguished amongthe hoof-prints of the bullocks. 

In the yard all was quiet. The fire had died down; the roof of thecattle-shed had fallen in and smothered the last embers. The barnwas a ruin, but no other damage had been done, and there were nosigns of the missing man. 

They turned back, this time making a wider circle. Almost under thekitchen window grew a dense thicket of laurel and other evergreenshrubs. Dick stooped and let the light of the lantern penetratebeneath the overhanging branches. 

There, within three steps of the house, lay Fergus, pale andblood-stained, with a sickening dent in his temple--a murdered man. 

Old Peter Dwyer was the first to break the silence: "The Lord begood to him! They've done for him this time, an' no mistake. "

The lifeless body was lifted gently and borne toward the house. Harold hastened in advance to make sure that none of the ladieswere astir to be shocked by the grisly sight. The hall was deserted. Doubtless Polly's condition demanded all their attention. 

"The girl saw him murdered, " muttered Mr. Connolly. "I thought itmust have been something out of the common to upset her so. "

"D' ye think did she, sir?" asked old Peter, eagerly. 

"I havnen't a doubt of it, " replied the old gentlemen shortly. "Thankgoodness, her evidence will hang the villain, whoever he may be. ""Ah, the poor thing, the poor thing!" murmured the servant, andthen the sad procession entered the house. 

The body was laid on a table. It would have been useless to sendfor a surgeon. There was not one to be found within several miles, and it was but too evident that life was extinct. The top of theman's head was beaten to a pulp. He had been clubbed to death. 

"If it costs me every shilling I have in the world, and my lifeto the boot of it, " said Mr. Connolly, "I'll see the ruffians thatdid the deed swing for their night's work. "

"Amin, " assented Peter, solemnly; and Jack's handsome face darkenedas he mentally recorded an oath of vengeance. 

"There'll be little sleep for this house to-night, " resumed theold gentleman after a pause. "I'm goin' to look round and see ifthe doors are locked, an' then take a look at Polly. An', Peter. "

"Sir!"

"The first light in the mornin'--it's only a few hours off, " headded, with a glance at his watch --"you run over to the policestation, and give notice of what's happened. "

"I will, yer honour. "

"Come upstairs with me, boys. I want to talk with you. Good-night, Mr. Hayes. This has been a blackguard business, but there's noreason you should lose your rest for it. "

Mr. Connolly left the room, resting his arms on the shoulders of histwo sons. Harold glanced at the motionless figure of the murderedman, and followed. He did not seek his bedroom, however; he knewit would be idle to think of sleep. He entered the smoking-room, lit a cigar, and threw himself into a chair to wait for morning. 

All his ideas as to the Irish question had been changing insensiblyduring his visit to Lisnahoe. This night's work had revolutionisedthem. He saw the agrarian feud--not as he had been wont to readof it, glozed over by the New York papers. He saw it as it was--inall its naked, brutal horror. 

He had observed that there had been no attempt on the Connollys toappeal to neighbours for sympathy in this time of trouble, and hehad asked Jack the reason. Jack's answer had been brief and pregnant. 

"Where's the good? We're boycotted. "

And that dead man lying on the table outside was only an exampleof boycotting carried to its logical conclusion. 

The sound of a door closing softly aroused Harold from his reverie. A little postern leading from the servants' quarters opened closeto the smoking-room window. Harold looked out, and, as the nighthad grown clearer, he distinctly saw old Pete Dwyer making his waywith elaborate caution down the shrubery path. 

"Going to the police station, I suppose, " mused Hayes. "Well, hehas started betimes. "

Then he resumed his seat and thought of Polly. 

What a shock for her, poor girl, to leave a happy home with herheart full of innocent mirth, only to encounter murder lurkingred-handed at the very threshold!

"I wish I had spoken to her to-day, " he muttered. "Goodness aloneknows when I shall find a chance now. I wonder how she is?"

He realised that he could see nothing of her till breakfast timeat any rate--if, indeed, she would be strong enough to appear atthat meal. He had been sitting in the dark; he now threw aside hiscigar, and, drawing his chair closer to the window, set himselfresolutely to watch for the dawn and solace his vigil with dreamsof Polly. 

A raw, chill air blew into the room. He noticed that a pane ofglass was broken. One of the children had thrown a ball through ita few days before, and in the present situation of the Connollyhousehold a glazier was an unattainable luxury. 

Harold rose with the intention of moving his chair out of thedraught, but as he did so the sound of whispered words, seeminglyat his very ear, made him pause. The voices came from the shrubberybelow the window, and in one of them he recognised the unmistakablebrogue of old Peter Dwyer. 

Had the man been to the police station and returned with the constablesso quickly? This was Harold's first thought, but he dismissed itas soon as formed. Peter had been barely half an hour absent, andthe station was several miles off. Where had he been, then, andwith whom was he conversing? Harold bent his head close to thebroken pane and listened. 

"Are ye sure sartin that the young woman seen us?" inquired a roughvoice--not Peter's--"because this is goin' to be an ugly job, an'there's no call for us to tackle it widout needcessity?"

"Sartin as stalks, " whispered the old servant. "She was all of athrimble, as if she'd met a sperrit an' all the words she had was'I seen it--I seen it all, ' an' she yowlin' like a banshee. "

"It's quare we didn't take notice to her, for she must ha' beenpowerful close to see us such a night. I thought I heerd the horn, too, an' I lavin' the yard. "

She wint out to blow it, " whispered Peter. "Most like it was stuckin the shrubbery she was. "

"Come on thin, " growled the other; "it's got to be done, an' thebyes is all here. Ye left the little dure beyant on the latch?"

"I did that, " responded old Peter; and then a low, soft whistlesounded in the darkness. It was a signal. 

Rapidly but cautiously Harold Hayes left the window and stoleacross the room. He understood it all. Polly had seen the murderand had recognised the assassins. Old Dwyer was a traitor. Hehad slipped out and warned the ruffians of the peril in which theystood, and now they were here to seal their own safety by anothercrime --by the sacrifice of a life far dearer to Harold than hisown. 

Swiftly, silently, he sped down the gloomy passage. The livesof all beneath that roof were hanging on his speed. Breathless hereached the little door, and flung himself against it with all hisweight while his trembling fingers groped in the darkness for boltor bar. 

A heavy hand was laid on the latch, and the door was tried fromwithout. 

"How's this, Peter?" inquired the rough voice. "I thought ye saidit wasn't locked. "

"No more it is; it's only stiff it is, bad cess to it. Push hard, yer sowl ye. "

But at this moment Harold's hand encountered the bolt. With a sighof relief he shot it into the socket, and then, searching farther, he supplemented the defences with a massive bar, which, he knew, ought always to be in place at night. 

Then he sped back along the passage, while muttered curses reachedhis ears from without, and the door was shaken furiously. 

"Jack, Jack, " he panted, as he flung open the door of the room inwhich the young men slept--"Jack, come down and--"

He stopped abruptly. Mr. Connolly was kneeling at the bedside, and his two sons knelt to the right and left of him. 

There were no family prayers at Lisnahoe; only the ladies wereregular church-goers; but that it was a religious household no onecould have doubted who knew the events of the night and saw theold man on his knees between his boys. 

They rose at the noise of Harold's entrance, and the American, whofelt that there were no moments to be wasted on apologies, announcedhis errand. 

"Old Peter Dwyer is a traitor! He has gone out and brought themurderers to finish the work they have commenced. "

And then, in eager, breathless words, he told them how he had heardthe conversation in the shrubbery, and how the men, apprehensivethat Miss Connolly could identify them, had returned to stifle hertestimony. 

"They were right there, " said the old man. "She saw the firstblow, and it was struck by Red Mike Driscoll. "

"Then she is better?" asked Harold, eagerly. 

The boys were at the other end of the room, slipping cartridgesloaded with small shot into the fowling-pieces they had snatchedfrom the walls. 

"Oh yes, " replied Mr. Connolly; "she is all right now. "

A sound of heavy blows echoed through the house. The men belowhad convinced themselves that the door was firmly fastened, and, desperate from the conviction that they were identified, and relyingon the loneliness of the place, they were attacking the barrierwith a pickaxe. 

"I'll soon put a stop to that, " cried Jack; and cocking his gun, he left the room. 

Dick was about to follow, but his father stopped him. 

There's no one in front of the house yet, " said the old gentleman. "Slip out quietly, my boy, and make a dash for it to the policestation. You've taken the cup for the two-mile race at Trinity. Let's see how quick you can be when you are running for all ourlives. "

"I'll go down and fasten the door after him, " volunteered Hayes, and the old man nodded. Outside, on the landing, they could hearthe blows of the pickaxe more distinctly. Suddenly, above the clangour, rang out close and sharp the two reports of Jack's double-barrel. He had selected a window commanding the attack, and had firedpoint-blank down into the group of men. 

Shrieks and groans and curses testified to the accuracy of theyoung man's aim, and the sound of blows ceased. Harold and Dickran rapidly downstairs. The latter unbarred the front door. 

"Don't you run a fearful risk if you are seen?" inquired theAmerican. 

"Of course I do, " returned the brave lad, without a tremor in hisvoice; "but somebody's got to take the chance; we can't defend thehouse forever; and I wouldn't miss this opportunity of nabbing thewhole gang for a thousand pounds. "

He opened the door and sped out into the night. He was out ofsight in a moment, and, as far as Harold could judge, he had notbeen observed. Again the blows of the pickaxe rang out from therear of the house. 

Hayes closed the door and replaced the heavy bar. Then he turnedto remount the stairs, and met Polly, who was standing near thetop with a candle in her hand. 

She was quite composed now, but very pale. He tried to ask if shehad recovered, but she cut him short impatiently. 

"There is nothing the matter with me. What is the meaning of allthis uproar and--and the firing?"

For at this moment the twin reports of Jack's breech-loader againechoed through the house, this time it was answered by a fusiladefrom below. 

There was nothing to be gained by concealment, and Harold told herthe whole story in a few words. 

"How prompt and clever of you!" she said; "You have saved all ourlives. "

Her praise was very sweet to him, but there was no time to enjoyit now. 

"Where are you going?" she asked, as he turned again to spring upthe stairs. 

I am going to my room for my revolver, " he answered. "I may haveuse for it before this is over. "

"Do, " she replied. "I will wait for you here. " Haves hurried on. 

Jack was in the guest's room. The young Irishman had selected thatwindow, as it commanded the little door against which the brunt ofthe attack had hitherto been directed. Every pane was shattered, and walls and ceiling showed the effect of the volley that hadbeen directed against him, but the young fellow stood his grounduninjured. "Don't mind me, " he said, in answer to Harold's inquiry. "I'm all right, and can hold this fort til morning if they don'tget ladders. I fancy I've sickened them of trying that door below. "

Harold hastily grasped his revolver and went His idea was to standin the passage near the smoking-room, and defend the place shouldthe door give way; for he did not believe that timber had ever beengrown to withstand such blows. 

Mrs. Connolly put her head out of the nursery door as he passed. Her husband had told her of the position of affairs. 

"Is that you, Mr. Hayes?" she whispered. "Is Jack hurt?"

"Jack is quite safe, " answered the young American. "Are the childrenvery much frightened?"

"Not as long as I am with them, " the old lady answered. "AndDick--what of him?"

"Dick is all right too, " replied Harold. He could not tell thepoor woman that her boy was out in the open country without a wallbetween him and the ruffians. 

Mrs. Connolly drew back into the nursery to take the post assignedher--assuredly not the easiest on that terrible night--to listento the doubtful sounds from without, and to support, by her ownconstancy, the courage of her children. 

Harold found Miss Connolly in the hall where he had left her. 

"What do you intend to do?" she asked. 

"I was going to stand inside the door they have been hammering at, "he answered, "in case they should break it in. "

"Papa is there, " said the girl; "perhaps you had better wait here. They will try the front door next"

"Very good, " he assented; and then added, with a sudden apprehension, "but the windows. There are so many of them. How can we watch themall?"

"There are bars to all the lower windows, " she replied, "and I donot think they know where to find ladders. No; their next attemptwill be at the hall door, and it will be harder to repel thananywhere else, for the portico will protect them from shots fromthe windows. "

"And now, Miss Connolly, " urged Harold, "you can do no good here. Had not you better go upstairs out of the way?"

"No, no; I would rather wait here, " she answered. "Don't be afraid. I sha'n't give way again as I did to-night. I don't know what cameover me, but it was all so horrible--so unexpected--" She brokeoff with a little shuddering sigh. 

"You saw them attack him?" asked Harold. 

She nodded. "I was under that big cedar outside the parlor window. I had hidden there to blow the horn. Suddenly I saw Fergus with alantern in his hand coming full speed toward the house. Just ashe got within a few paces of me, half a dozen men burst out fromthe laurels. Oh, how savagely they struck at him! He was down ina moment. It was all so close to me: I recognised Red Mike by thelight of poor Fergus's lantern. "

"And then?" asked Hayes. 

"I don't think I remember any more. I must have staggered on tothe house, for they tell me I was found at the foot of the steps, but I don't know how I got there. I was terribly frightened, butI sha'n't do it again--not if they blow the roof off, " she said, trying to smile. 

"I should think they would be afraid to persevere now that theyare discovered, " observed Harold. "This firing must alarm theneighbourhood. "

"In a lonely place like this!" said the girl. "No, no, Mr. Hayes;there are not many to hear these shots, and none that would not soonerfight against us than on our side. We must depend on ourselves. But oh, " she wailed, her woman's heart betraying itself through themechanical calm she had maintained so long, "oh, I am sorry thatyour friendship for us should have brought you into such peril--tothink that your visit here may cost you your life, " and she brokeoff and covered her streaming eyes with her hands. 

"Indeed, indeed, " said Harold, earnestly, "I think any danger Imay run a small price to pay for the privilege of knowing you, and, and--of loving you. "

It was out at last; the words that had been so difficult to saycame trippingly from his tongue now, and she did not repulse norattempt to licence him. 

There, in the dimly lighted, lofty hall, he poured out all thathad been in his heart since he had known her, and won from herin return a whisper that emboldened him to draw the yielding formtoward him and press his lips to hers. 

With a pealing crash the pickaxe bit into the stout oaken door, andthe young lovers sprang apart, terrified at this rude interruptionof dreams. Blow followed blow, and the massive woodwork shiveredand splintered and swayed under the savage impulse from without. 

The assailants had abandoned their attempt on the postern; they hadignored the kitchen door, within which stout Tom Neil with Dick'sdouble-barrel stood on guard; they had turned their attention tothe main entrance, where a projecting portico partially shelteredthem from the galling discharges of Jack's favourite "Rigby. "

They were only partially sheltered, however. The heir of Lisnahoehad quickly shifted his ground when the attack on the posternwas abandoned, and he now stood in another room, ready, with thequickness of a practised snipe-shot, to fire on any arm or handor foot which showed even for an instant outside the shadow of theportico. 

Crash, crash, crash! Again and again the steel fangs of the pickate their way through the solid timber. The lock yielded quickly, but, heavily barred at top and bottom, the good door resistedstaunchly. Polly had glided away from Harold's side. He fanciedthat she had sought a place of safety, and rejoiced thereat; butin a moment she reappeared. She carried a shot-gun in her hands, and when she reached his side she rested the butt on the groundand leaned on the weapon. 

"I have often fired at things, " she said, simply. "Why shouldn'tI now?"

Mr. Connolly and Jack joined them in the hall, and Neil had come upfrom the kitchen door. The main entrance was evidently the weakpoint, and the whole garrison must be on hand to defend it. Theassailants had waxed cautious of late, and for some time had allowedthe sharp-shooter no chance. He thought that he would be of moreservice below; but, as it proved, when he abandoned his post hecommitted a fatal error. 

Apparently the enemy had discovered that the galling fire fromabove had ceased. Perhaps some of their number had ventured out andreturned scatheless. They speedily took advantage of this immunity. While the attacks with the pickaxe were not relaxed for a moment, a score of men had brought the trunk of a young larch from thesaw-pit at the back of the house. Poised by forty strong arms, this improvised battering-ram was hurled against the front door, carrying it clear off its hinges. In the naked entry a crowd ofrough men jostled one another, as they sprang forward with hoarseimprecations on their prey. The garrison was vanquished at last. 

Not yet. Four shots rang out as one, instantly repeated as thedefenders discharged their second barrels into the very teeth ofthe advancing mob. Then Mr. Connolly, Neil, and Jack clubbed theguns they had no time to reload, and prepared to sell their livesdearly in a hand-to-hand struggle. Polly, as soon as she had fired, dropped her weapon, and in an instant Harold had swept her behindhim, and stood, revolver in hand, his breast her bulwark, confrontingthe mob. 

But the mob, withered by the volley, hesitated a moment. The vestibulewas streaming with blood, and shrieking, writhing victims strovein vain to rise. It was a sickening sight, but there was theelectricity of anger in the air and no one faltered long. On theycame again with undiminished fury. 

But again the rush was checked. Sharp and vengeful rang out theclose reports of the American revolver, and at each echo a man fell. Less noisy, less terrific, but far more deadly, the six-shootertook up the work where the breech-loaders had left it; and Harold, covering with his body the girl he loved, fired as steadily as ifpractising in a pistol gallery, and made every shot tell. 

He had not used his weapon in the first rush; somewhere or other, young Hayes had heard of the advantages of platoon firing. 

The lights had been extinguished and day was just breaking. Firingfrom the obscurity into the growing light, the garrison had thebest of the position; but there were firearms among the assailantstoo, and the balls whistled through the long hall and buriedthemselves in the panelling. 

But this could not last. Much as they had suffered in the assault, the assailants were too numerous to be longer held at bay. With afeeling of despair, Harold recognised the futile click that followedhis pressure on the trigger and told him that he had fired his lastcartridge. 

With a wild yell the assailants rushed forward. Not a shot metthem; nothing stood between them and their vengeance but four pale, determined men, weaponless but unflinching. 

A quick trampling as of a body of horse was heard on the gravelwithout. A sharp, stern order reached the ears even of those inthe house. 

"Unsling carbines! Make ready! Present!"

Clubs and blunderbusses dropped from nerveless hands as theadvancing mob paused, faltered, and then surged backward throughthe doorway. The lust of vengeance gave way to the instinct ofself-preservation, and the rioters scattered in flight. 

Dick's gallant race against time had not been fruitless. A squadronof constabulary had reached the ground at the critical moment, andLisnahoe was saved. 

Few of the assailants escaped--every avenue was guarded by mountedpolicemen; and the gang which had long terrorised the neighbourhood--whoseteachings and example had done so much to convert the sullendiscontent of the peasantry into overt violence--was effectuallybroken up. From that night the boycott on the Connolly householdwas raised. 

Red Mike Driscoll expiated on the gallows the murder of the Emergencyman Fergus, and nearly a score of others were sentenced to variousterms of imprisonment for assault and housebreaking. 

The attacking party had lost three men killed, besides many wounded, more or less severely, by the shot-guns. The judicial inquiry intothe casualties brought out details of the defence which struckterror to the hearts of the country people. It was not likely thatLisnahoe would be molested again. 

Harold Hayes and Polly Connolly were married shortly after Easter. They are living in New York now, in a pleasant flat overlookingCentral Park. They entertain a good deal, and Irish affairs aresometimes discussed at Mr. Hayes's table; but so far he has failedto convince any of his American friends that there may be more thanone side to the agrarian question in Ireland. 

"Nonsense, " remarked one gentleman, who professed to be deeplyread in the subject; "they are an oppressed and suffering people. Let them have their land. "

"And what is to become of the landlords?" inquired Polly, with awistful remembrance of her girlhood's beautiful home. 

But to this question there has been no reply, and none has beenoffered yet. 

A LOST RECRUIT

BY JANE BARLOW

When Mick Doherty heard that there was to be route-marching nextday in the neighbourhood of Kilmacrone, he determined upon goingoff for a long "stravade" coastward over the bog, where there wereno roads worth mentioning, and no risks of an encounter with themilitary. In this he acted differently from all his neighbours, most of whom, upon learning the news, began to speculate and planhow they might see and hear as much as possible of their unwontedvisitors. Opinions were chiefly divided as to whether the Murghadeencross-roads would be the best station to take up, or the fork ofthe lane at Berrisbawn House. People who, for one reason or another, could not go so far afield, consoled themselves by reflecting thatthe band, at any rate, would be likely to come through the village, and would no doubt strike up a tune while passing, as it had donea couple of years ago, the last time the redcoats had appearedin Kilmacrone. And, och, but that was the grand playin' intirely!It done your heart good just to be hearin' the sound of it, bedad it did so. Old Mrs. Geoghegan said it was liker the sort ofthunder-storms they might be apt to have in heaven above than aughtelse she could think of, might goodness forgive her for sayin' sucha thing; and Molly Joyce said she'd as lief as not have sat downand cried when't was passed beyond her listenin', it went thatdelightful thumpety-thump, wid the tune flyin' up over it. 

The military authorities at Fortbrack were not ignorant of thispopular sentiment, and had considered it in the order of thatday. For experience had shown that a progress of troops through thesurrounding country districts generally conduced to the appearancebefore the recruiting officer of sundry long-limbed, loose-jointedPats, Micks, and Joes; and a recent scarcity of this raw materialmade it seem expedient to bring such an influence to bear upon thenew ground of remote Kilmacrone. Certain brigades and squadronswere accordingly directed to move thitherward, under the generalidea that an invading force from the southeast had occupied BallybegAllan, while in pursuance of another general idea, really moreto the purpose, though not officially announced, the accompanyingband received instructions to be liberal and lively in itsperformances by the way. 

All along their route through the wide brown land the soldiers mightbe sure of drawing as much sympathetic attention as that lonesomewest country could concentrate on any given line. Probably therewould be no one disposed, like Mick Doherty, to get out of theway, unless some very small child roared and ran, if of a size tohave acquired the latter accomplishment, at the sound of the boomingdrums. To the great majority of these onlookers the spectaclewould be a rare and gorgeous pageant, a memory resplendent acrosstwilight-hued time-tracts as a vision of scarlet and golden gleams, and proudly pacing horses, and music that made you feel you hadnever known how much life there was in you all the while. Sometoll, it is true, had to be paid for this enjoyment. When it hadpassed by things suddenly grew very flat and colourless, and therewas a tendency to feel more or less vaguely aggrieved becauseyou could not go a-soldiering yourself. In cases, however, wherecircumstances rendered that obviously impossible, as when peoplewere too old or infirm, or were women or girls, this thrill ofdiscontent, seldom very acute, soon subsided, by virtue of theself-preserving instinct which forbids us to persist in knockingour heads hard against our stone walls. But it was different wherethe beholder was so situated that he could imagine himself ridingor striding after the rapturous march-music to fields of periland valour and glory, without diminishing the vividness of thepicture by simultaneously supposing himself some quite other person. The gleam in young Felix M'Guinness's eyes, as he watched the redfiles dwindle and twinkle out of sight, was to the brightening upbeneath his grandfather's shaggy brows as the forked flash is tothe shimmering sheet-lightnings, that are but a harmless reflectionfrom far-off storms. And there, indeed, pleasure paid a ruinousduty. If those who were liable to it did not imitate Mick Doherty'sprudence and hold aloof, the reason may have been that they hadnot fortitude enough to turn away from excitement offered on anyterms, or that their position was less desperately tantalising thanhis; and the latter explanation is the more probable one, since fewlads in and about Kilmacrone can have had their martial aspirationsbaulked by an impediment so flimsy and yet so effectual. 

There was nothing in the world to hinder Mick from enlistingexcept just the unreasonableness of his mother, and that was anunreasonableness so unreasonable as to verge upon hat her neighbourswould hare called "quare ould conthrariness. " For, though a widowwoman, and therefore entitled to occupy a pathetic position, itsprivileges were defined by the opinion that "she was not so badlyoff intirely as she might ha' been. " Mick's departure need nothave left her desolate, since she had another son and daughter athome, besides Essie married in the village, and Brian settled downat Murghadeen, here he was doing well, and times and again askingher to come and live with him. Then Mick would have been able tohelp her out of his pay much more efficaciously than he could doby his earnings at Kilmacrone, where work was slack and its wagelow, so that the result of a lad's daily labour sometimes seemedmainly the putting of a fine edge on a superfluous appetite. All thesepoints were most clearly seen by Mick in the light of a fiercelyburning desire; but that availed him nothing unless he could setthem as plainly before some one else who was not thus illuminated. And not far from two years back he had resolved that he wouldattempt to do so no more. 

The soldiers had been about in the district on the day before, scattered like poppy beds over the bog, and signalling and firingtill the misty October air tingled with excitement. When you havelived your life among wide-bounded solitudes, where the silence isoftenest broken by the plover's pipe or the croak of some heavilyflapping bird, you will know the meaning of a bugle-call. Mickand his contemporaries had acted as camp-followers from early tilllate with ever intensifying ardour; one outcome whereof was that heheard his especial crony, Paddy Joyce, definitely decide to go andenlist at Fortbrack next Monday, which gave a turn more to thepinching screw of his own banned wish. It was with a concertedscheme for ascertaining whether there were any chance of bringinghis mother round to a rational view of the matter that he and hisfriend dropped into her cabin next morning on the way to carry upa load of turf. Mrs. Doherty was washing her couple of blue-checkedaprons in an old brown butter-crock, and Mick thought he hadintroduced the subject rather happily when he told her "she had aright to be takin' her hands out of the suds, and dippin' the finestcurtsey she could conthrive, and she wid the Commander-in-Gineralof the Army Forces steppin' in to pay her a visit. " Of course thisstatement required, as it was intended to require, elucidation, so Mick proceeded to announce: "It's himself's off to Fortbracka-Monday, 'listin' he'll be in the Edenderry Light Infantry; so thenext time we set eyes on him it's blazin' along the street we'llsee him, like the boys we had here yisterday. "

"Ah! sure now, that'll be grand, " said Mrs. Doherty, unwarilycomplaisant; "we'll all be proud to behold him that way. 'T is afine thing far any young man who's got a fancy to take up wid it. "

"Och, then, bedad it is so!" said Mick, with emphasis, promptlymaking for the opening given to him. 

"Bedad it is, " said Paddy. 

"There's nothin' like it, " said Mick. 

"Ah, nothin' at all, " said Paddy. 

Mrs. Doherty made no remark as she twisted a dripping apron intoa sausage-shaped roll to wring the water out. 

"How much was it you were sayin' you'd have in the week, Paddy, just to put in your pocket for your divarsion like?" inquired Mick, with a convenient lapse of memory. 

"Och, seven or eight shillin's anyway, " said Paddy, in the tone ofone to whom shillings had already become trivial coins; "and that, mind you, after you've ped for the best of aitin' and dhrinkin', and your kit free, and no call to be spendin' another penny unlessyou plase. Sure, Long Murphy was tellin' me he was up in the townawhile ago, on a day when they were just after gettin' their pay, and he said the Post-Office was that thick wid the soldier ladssendin' home the money to their friends, he couldn't get speech ofa clerk to buy his stamp be no manner of manes, not if he'd wreckedthe place. 'T was the Sidmouth Fusileers was in at that time;they're off to Limerick now. "

"But that's a grand regulation they have, " said Mick, "wid theshort service nowadays. Where's the hardship in it when a man canquit at the ind of three year, if he's so plased? Three year's notime to speak of. "

"Sure, not at all; you'd scarce notice it passin' by. Like BarneyBralligan's song that finished before it begun--isn't that the wayof it, ma'am?"

"It's a goodish len'th of a while, " said Mrs. Doherty. 

"But thin there's the lave; don't be forgettin' the lave, Paddyman. Supposin' we--"

"Tub be sure, there's the lave. Why, it's skytin' home on lave theydo be most continial. And the Edenderrys is movin' no farther thanjust to Athlone; that's as handy a place as you could get. "

"You'd not thravel from this to Athlone in the inside of a week, if it was iver so handy, " said Mrs. Doherty. 

"Is it a week? Och! blathershins, Mrs. Doherty, ma'am, you'remistook intirely. Sure, onst you've stepped into the town yonder, the train'll take you there in a flash. And the trains do be oncommonconvenient. "

"Free passes!" prompted Mick. 

"Ay, bedad, and free passes they'll give to any souldier takin'his furlough; so sorra the expense 't would be supposin' Mick herehad a notion to slip home of an odd day and see you. "

"MICK!" said Mrs. Doherty. 

"Och well, I was just supposin'. But I'm tould" --the many remarkablefacts which Paddy had been tould lost nothing in repetition--"thatthey'll sometimes have out a special train for a man in the army, if he wants to go anywhere partic'lar in a hurry; there's iligancefor you. And as for promotion, it's that plinty you'll scarce gittime to remimber your rank from one day to the next, whether it'sa full private you are, or a lance-corporal, or maybe somethin'greater. Troth, there's nothin' a man mayn't rise to. And then, Mrs. Doherty, it's the proud woman you'd be--ANYBODY'D be--that theyhadn't stood in the way of it. And pensions--he might be pensionedoff wid as much as a couple of shillin's a day. "

"Not this long while yet, plase the pigs, " broke out Mick, squaringhis shoulders, as if Time were a visible antagonist, and momentarilyforgetting the matter immediately in hand. "But there's chances init--splendid--och, it's somethin' you may call livin'. "

"And, " said his friend, "the rations, I'm tould, is surprisin' thesetimes. The top of everythin' that's to be got, uncooked, widoutbone. "

Paddy and Mick discoursed for a good while in this strain about thedignities and amenities of a military life, and Mrs. Doherty hadnot much to say on the subject. During the conversation, however, she continued to rinse one of her aprons, and wring it dry verycarefully, and drop it back into the water, like a machine slightlyout of gear, which goes on repeating some process ineffectually. Thetwo friends read in her silence an omen of acquiescent conviction, and congratulated each other upon it with furtive nods and winks. Mick went off to the bog in high feather, believing that theinterview had been a great success, and that his mother was, asPaddy put it, "comin' round to the notion gradual, like an ouldgoat grazin' round its tetherin' stump. " His hopes, indeed, wereso completely in the ascendant that he summed up his most seriousuneasiness when he said to himself: "She'll do right enough, no fear, or I'd niver think of it, if Thady was just somethin'steadier. But sure he might happen to git a thrifle more wit yet;he's no great age to spake of. "

But when he came home about sunsetting, his mother was feeding herfew hens outside their cabin, the end one of a mossy-roofed row, with its door turned at right angles to the others, looking outacross the purple brown of the bog-land to the far-off hills, faint, like a blue mist with a waved pattern in it, against the horizon. Mick, brought up short by the group, woke out of his walking dream, in which he had been performing acts of valour to the tune of the"Soldier's Chorus" in Gounod's Faust, the last thing the band hadplayed yesterday; and he noticed a diminution in the select circleof fowls, who crooned and crawked and pecked round the broken dishof scraps. 

"I see the specklety pullet's after strayin' on you agin, " he said;"herself's the conthrary little bein'; I must take a look aboutfor her prisintly. "

"Ah, sure she's sold, " said his mother; "it's too many I hadaltogether. I was torminted thryin' to git feedin' for them. SoI sold her this mornin' to Mrs. Dunne at Loughmore, that gave me afine price for her. 'Deed she'd have took her off of me this whileback, on'y I'd just a sort of notion agin' partin' from the crathur. But be comin' in to your supper, child alive; it's ready waitin'this good while. Molly's below at her sister's, and I dunno wereThady's off to, so there's on'y you and me in it to-night. "

In the room the more familiar odour of turf-smoke was overborneby a crisp smell of baking, and Mrs. Doherty picked up a steamingplate which had been keeping warm on the hearth. "Isn't that somethin'like, now?" she said, setting it on the table triumphantly. "Ralegrand they turned out this time, niver a scorch on the whole ofthem. I was afeard me hand might maybe ha' got out o' mixin' them, 'tis so long since I had e'er a one for you; but sure I bought ahalf-stone of seconds wid the price of the little hin, and that'llmake a good few, so it will, jewel avic, and then we must see aftersome more. Take one of the thick bits, honey. "

Probably most of us have had experience of the unceremoniousmethods which Fate often chooses when communicating to us importantarrangements. We have seen by what a little seeming trivialityof an incident she may intimate that our cherished hope has beenstruck dead, or that the execution of some other decree has turnedthe current of our life away. It is sometimes as if she contemptuouslysent us a grotesque and dwarfish messenger, who makes grimaces atus while telling us the bad news, which is ungenerous and scarcelydignified. So we need not wonder if Mick Doherty had to read thedeath-warrant of his darling ambition in a pile of three-corneredgriddle-cakes. At any rate, he did read it there swiftly as clearly. Most likely he knew it all before the plate was set on the table, and his heart had already gone down with a run when he repliedto his mother's commendations that they looked first-rate. As heindorsed this praise with what appetite he could, being, indeed, mechanically hungry, the uppermost thought in his mind was how heshould at once let his mother understand that she had got the priceshe hoped for her pet hen; and after considering for a while, hesaid: "Did you ever notice the quare sort of lane-over the turf-stackout there's takin' on it? I question hadn't we done righter to havetook a leveller bit of ground for under it. But I was thinkin' thismornin'"--of what a different subject he had been thinking!--"thatnext year I'd thry buildin' it agin' the back o' th' ould shed, where there does be ne'er a slant at all. "

"Ay, sure that 'ud be grand, " said Mrs. Doherty, much more elatedthan if she had heard of a large fortune; "you couldn't find aniliganter place for it in the width of this world. " She felt quitesatisfied that her craftily timed treat had dispelled the dreadeddanger, which actually was the case in a way. But if Mick wouldstay at home with her, she was perfectly content to suppose that shecame after a griddle-cake in his estimation. Her relief made herunusually talkative; but Mick was reflecting between his answershow he must now tell Paddy Joyce that they were never to be comradesafter all. 

He went out on this mission immediately after supper. The sun hadgone down, and the cold clearness left showed things plainly, yetwas not light. In front of the cabin-rows the small children of theplace were screeching over their final romp and quarrel, as theydid every evening; fowls and goats and pigs were settling down forthe night with the squawks and bleats and squeals which also tookplace every evening; on the brown-hollowed grass-bank betweenColgan's and O'Reilly's, old Morissy, the blind fiddler, was feeblyscraping and twangling, according to his custom every evening, and, for that matter, all day long. Even the wisps of straw and scrapsof paper blowing down the middle of the wide roadway seemed tohave whirled over and over and caught in the rough patches of stonejust so, as often as the sun had set. Close to the Joyces', Mickmet Peter Maclean driving home a brood of ducklings. A broad andburly man, who says "shoo-shoo" to a high-piping cluster of tinyyellow ducks, and flourishes a long willow wand to keep them fromstraggling out of their compacted trot, does undoubtedly presentrather an absurd appearance; yet I cannot explain why the sightshould have seemed to prick like a sting through the wide wearydisgust which Mick experienced as he stood in the twilit boreenwaiting for Paddy to come out. He had scarcely a grunt to exchangefor Peter's cheerful "Fine evenin'. " What does it signify in auniversal desert whether evenings be fine or foul? Altogether, itwas a bad time; and Mick acted wisely in taking precautions againstits recurrence, especially as the obstacles which had confrontedhim nearly two years back were now more hope-baffling than ever. For the intervening months had not brought the desirable "thriflemore wit" to his unsteady brother Thady, who, on the contrary, was developing into one of those people whose good-for-nothingnessis taken as a matter of course even by themselves; and a bolt wasthus, so to speak, drawn across Mick's locked door. 

He set off betimes on his long ramble. It was a cloudless Julymorning--the noon of summer by air and light as well as by thecalendar. Even the barest tracts of the bog-land, which vary theiraspect as little as may be from shifting season to season, wereflecked with golden furze-blossom, and whitened with streamingtufts of fairy-cotton, and sun-warmed herbs were fragrant underfoot. Mick rather hurried over this stage of his "stravade, " partlybecause he foresaw a blazing hot day, and he wished to be amongmore broken ground, where there are sheltered hollows scooped inthe "knockawns, " and cool patches under their bushes and boulders. He entered the region of these things before his shadow had shrunkto its briefest; for not so very far beyond Kilmacrone the smoothfloor of the big bog crumples itself into crusts and ridges, as ifit had caught the trick from its bounding ocean; and the nearerit comes to the shore the higher it heaves itself, until at lastit is cut short by a sheer cliff wall, with storm-stunted bramblesand furzes cowering along the edge, fathoms above a base-line ofexuberant weed and foam. The long sea-frontage of this rock-rampartis fissured by only a few narrow clefts. On the left hand, facingoceanward, the coast is a labyrinth of mountain fiords, straits, and bays, where you may see great craggy shoulders and domed summitswaver in their crystal calm at the flick of a gull's dipping wing, or add to the terror of the tempest as they start out black andunmoved behind rifts of swirling mists. On the right there is thesame fretwork of land and water, but wrought in less high relief--atract of lonely strands, where shells and daisies whiten the grass, and pink-belled creepers trail, entangled with tawny-podded wrack, across the shingle. You are apt thereabouts to happen on clatteringpebble-banks and curling foam when you are apparently deep amongmeadows and corn-land, or to come on sturdy green potato-drillsround some corner where you had confidently supposed the unstablefurrows of the sea. And the intricate ground-plan of the districtmust be long studied before you can always feel sure whether thelow-shelving swarded edges by which you are walking frame salt orfresh water. 

Mick was bound eventually for one of those ravines which cleavethe cliffs' precipitous wall and give access to the shore, generallyby a deep-sunken sandy boreen. Here, under a tall bank, there area couple of cabins, besides another which, having lost its roof, may be reckoned as a half; so that Tullykillagin is not a largeplace, even as places go in its neighbourhood. He knew, however, that he could count upon getting something to eat at either ofthe two cabins first mentioned, and, indeed, at the bare-rafteredone also, if, as often chanced, it was occupied by Tim Fottrel, the gatheremup; and this prospect served for an incentive, feebleenough, though it strengthened a little as the hours wore on. Solanguid, in fact, was his resolution that at one moment he thoughthe would just sthreel home again without going any farther; if hewent aisy everybody would have cleared out of Kilmacrone before hegot back. But at this time he was sitting among some broom-bushes, under which last year's withered black pods were strewn, and hedetermined that if there were an odd number of seeds in the firstone he opened he would go on to Tullykillagin. There were nine init, and he logically continued to loiter seaward. 

He dawdled so much that when he came to the cliff the sun alreadyhung low over the water, and as he walked along the edge his shadowstretched away far inland across the dappled pale and dark greenof the furze-fretted sward. The sea unrolled a ceaseless scrollof faint wild-hyacinth colour, on which invisible breeze-waftsinscribed and erased mysterious curves and strokes like hieroglyphics. Here and there it showed deep purple stains; for a flight of littlesnowflake clouds were fluttering in from the Atlantic, followedat leisure by deep-folded, glistering drifts, now massed on thehorizon-rim to muffle the descending sun. Yet that tide, with allits smoothness, showed a broad band of foam wherever it touchedthe pebbles, which lay dry before its sliding, for it was on itsway in. It had nearly reached the cliff's foot in most places;but Mick presently came to a point where he looked down on a smallfield of very green grass, set as an oasis between the waves andthe walling rock, with a miniature chaos of heaped-up bouldersto left and right. A few of them were scattered over it, and eventhe highest of these wore a scarf of leathery flat sea-ribbon, intoken of occasional submergence; but amongst them grew hawthorn andsloe bushes, and a clump of scarlet-tasselled fuchsia. To heightenthe incongruity of its aspect, this pasture was inhabited by a largestrawberry cow, who seemed to be enjoying the alternate mouthfulsof seaweed and woodbine, which she munched off a thickly wreathedboulder, untroubled by the fact that the meal bade fair to be herlast, since the rising spring tide had already all but cut offaccess on either hand, and would still flow for some hours. 

"Musha, now I'll be skivered, " said Mick, standing still, "if that'snot Joe McEvoy's ould cow. You 'll be apt to experience a dampin', ould woman, if you don't quit out of there. Whethen, it's a quareman he is to lave the baste sthrayin' about permiscuous in thewelther of the tide. "

He peered over the edge of the cliff, evidently mistrusting itssmooth face; and then he threw several stones and clods at thecow, with shouts of "Hi, out of that!" and "Shoo along!" But hismissiles fell short of their mark, and if his voice reached her, she treated it with the placid disregard of which her kind aremistress on such occasions, and never raised her crumple-hornedhead. 

"Have it your own way, then, " said Mick, cynically; "it's nothin'to me if you've a mind to thry a taste of swimmin' under wather. "

He had not, however, strolled much farther when he met with somebodywho was vastly more concerned about the animal's impending fate. This was old Joe McEvoy himself, who, out of the mouth of a steep, sandy boreen, sprang up suddenly, like a jack-fn-the-box-one of theshock-wigged, saturnine-complexioned pattern. But no jack-in-the-boxcould have looked so flurriedly distracted, or have muttered toitself such queer execrations as he did, hobbling along. 

"A year's loadin' of bad luck to the whoule of thim!" he was sayingwith gasps when Mick approached; "there's not a one of thim but'ud do desthruction on herself sooner than lose a chanst to beannoyin' anybody, if she could conthrive it no other way. "

"If it's th' ould cow you're cursin', " said Mick, "she's down belowyonder. "

"Och, tell me somethin' I dunno, you gomeral, not but what I'm nighas big a one meself as can be, to go thrust her wid that littleimp of mischief. Bad scran to it, I must give me stiff leg a rest, and she 'll be up here blatherin' after me before you can lookround, you may bet your brogues she will. "

"Gomeral yourself and save your penny, " said Mick, whose temperwas not at its best after his long day of hungry discontent. "Andthe divil a call you have to be onaisy about the crathur follyin'you anywheres. Stayin' where she is she's apt to be, until shegets the chanst of goin' out to say wid the turn of the tide, andthat's like enough to happen her. "

"And who at all was talkin' of the cow follyin'? It's ould BiddyDuggan down below that nivir has her tongue off of me, nagglin' atme for lettin' the poor crathur pick her bit along the beach, andit a strip of the finest grass in the townland, when it's abovewather, just goin' to loss. A couple of pints differ extry it doesbe makin' in the milkin' of a day she's grazed there. But it'sthreatenin' dhrowndin' and disthruction over it th' ould bansheeis this great while; and plased she 'll be, rale plased and sotup. Sure, that's what goes agin' me, to be so far gratifyin' her, and herself as mischevious, harm-hopin' an ould toad as iver I hatedthe sight of--Och, bejabers, didn't I tell you so? It's herselfcomin' gabble-gobblin' up. "

As he spoke, a very small, meagre, raggged old woman emergedswiftly from the lane, accompanied by one younger and stouter andless nimble of foot, her temporary neighbour, Mrs. Gatheremup. Mrs. Duggan seemed to bear out Joe's character of her; for now, likeSpenser's hag Occasion, "ever as she went her tongue did walk, " andthe path it took was not one of peace. "Maybe, after this happenin', some she could name might have the wit to believe what other peopletould thim, who knew bitter than to be thinkin' to feed a misfortnitcrathur of an ould cow on sand and sayweed as if she was a sayl ora saygull, and it a scandal to the place to behould her foostherin'along down there wid the waves' edges slitherin' up to her nose, and she sthrivin' to graze, and the slippery stones fit to breakher neck. " Such was the purport of Mrs. Duggan's remarks, whichwere punctuated by Joe McEvoy's peremptory requests that she wouldlave gabbin' and givin' impidence, and his appeals to the othersto inform him whether they weren't all to be pitied for havin' toput up wid the ould screech-owl's foolish talk. 

"Sure, that's the way they do be keepin' it up continial, Mickylad, " Mrs. Fottrel called to him, shrilly, as if athwart gusts ofhigh wind. "I'll pass yon me word the two of thim 'll stand at theirdoors of an evenin" and give bad langwidge to aich other acrossthe breadth of the road till they have us all fairly moidhered widthe bawls of thim, and I on'y wonder the thatch doesn't take andslip down on their ould heads. "

"Belike it's lave of the likes of YOU I ought to be axin' where I'mto git grazin' for me own cattle?" a growl of sarcastic thunderwas just then observing, to which flashed a scathing response: "And, bedad, then, it's lave you had a right to be axin' afore you sentoff me poor son Hughey's bit of a Pat, to be wastin' his timemindin' your ould scarecrow and gettin' himself dhrownded in thetide. It's no thanks to you if the innicent child isn't as likeas not lyin' this minute under six fut of could wather, instead offetchin' me in the full of me kettle that I'm roarin' to him forthis half-hour, and niver a livin' sinner widin sight or--"

"Saints above! is little Pat strayin' along wid the cow?" said Mrs. Fottrel, much aghast. "I was noticin' I didn't see him anywheresthis evenin'. What's to become of him down there, and it risin'beyond the heighth of iverythin' as fast as it can flow? Sure, thismornin' 't was wallopin' itself agin' the wall, back of our place, fit to swally all before it. "

"Why didn't you tell me the child was below?" said Mick. "I'd lepdown there and fetch him up aisy enough; on'y there was no mortialuse goin' after the cow, for niver a crathur that took its standon four hoofs 'ud git its own len'th up the cliff, unless it mightbe some little divil of a goat. And the wather's dhrowndin'-deepalongside it afore now. "

"Musha, good gracious! sure, all I done was to bid the spalpeen bekeepin' an eye on her now and agin while he would be playin' aboutthere, " said Joe; "and it's twinty chances if ivir he did at all. Trapesed off wid himself somewheres; he'll be right enough be thistime. 'T is n't the likes of him to go to loss, it's the quarefive-poun' note he'd fetch at Athenry fair. "

"He might ha' broke his legs climbin' disp'rit on the rocks, " saidMrs. Fottrel, unconvinced by the argument from unsaleability, " andbe lyin' there now waitin' for the say-waves to wash the life outof him. Heaven pity the crathur!"

"Sure, I 'll step down and see what's gone wid him, " said Mick. 

The descent of the cliff, though not riskless, was no great featfor an active youth, and Mick accomplished it safely, but to littlepurpose, he thought at first, since the irreclaimable cow appearedto be the sole denizen of the shrinking beach. However, when hehad shouted and scrambled for some time without result, he cameabruptly upon a nook among the piled-up rocks, where a very smallblack-headed boy in tattered petticoats was digging the sandy floorwith a razor-shell. 

"Och, it's there you are, " said Mick, stepping down from a weedyledge; "and what have you in it at all that you didn't hear mebawlin' to you?"

"Throops, " said Pat, gloatingly, almost too absorbed t o glanceoff his work; "it's Ballyclavvy, the way it did be in the schoolreadin'-book at Duffclane. There's the Roossian guns" (he pointedto a row of black-mouthed mussel-shells, mounted on periwinklecarriages), "and here's the sides of the valley I'm makin'; longand narrer it was. Just step round and look at it from where I am, Micky, but don't be clumpin' your fut on the French cavalary. "

"The divil's in it all, " said Mick, with a sudden bitter vehemence, which he accounted for to himself by adding, as he pointed towardthe seething white line: "D' you see where that's come to, youlittle bosthoon? And you sittin' grubbin' away here as if you werepitaty-diggin' a dozen mile inland. "

Pat looked in the desired direction, but misapprehended the objectto be the western sky, where an overblown fiery rose seemed to havescattered all its petals broadcast. "Sure, that's on'y the sun settin'red like, " he explained, indifferently, and would have resumed hisexcavations if he had not been seized and hustled half-way up thecliff before he could disengage his mind from his brigades andbatteries. Both heads soon bobbed up over the edge without accident;for Pat climbed like a monkey when once he had grasped the situation. His grandmother's attitude toward Joe McEvoy constrained her toreceive him effusively as prey snatched from the foaming jaws ofdeath; but it was out of Mrs. Fottrel's pocket that a peppermint-dropcame to sweetly seal his new lease of life. 

"And what are you after now, Mick?" she said, observing that, instead of drawing himself up to level ground, he stood poised onan uncomfortable perch, and looked back the steep way he had come. 

"I'm thinkin' to slip down agin, " he said, "and see if be any mannerof manes I could huroosha th' ould baste round the rocks yonder. The wather mightn't be altogither too deep there yit; at all evints, she's between the divil and the deep say where she is now; it'sjust a chanst. "

"Sorra a much, " said Joe, disconsolately; "scarce worth breakin'your bones after, any way. "

"Bones, how are you? Sure, there's no call to be breakin' bones inthe matter, " said Mick, beginning to descend. This was true enough, if he had minded what he was about; but then he did not. So far fromit, he was saying to himself, "One 'ud ha' thought now she mightha' took a sort of pride in it, " when the bottom of the world seemedto drop away from under his feet, and his irrelevant meditationsended in a shattering thud down on the rocky pavement a long waybelow. He never heard the shouts and shrieks which the incidentoccasioned above his head. Once only he became dimly conscious ofa quivering network of prismatic flashes, which he could not seethrough, and a booming throb in his ears, which made him murmurdazedly: "Wirra, I thought I'd got beyond hearin' of them drums. "In another moment: "What's took me?" he said, with a start. Butthe depths he sank among remain always dark and silent. 

Next day messengers from Tullykillagin told Mrs. Doherty that theLord had "took" her son Mick, and that "he had gone out to say widthe tide, before they could get anybody to him, and there was notellin' where he might be swep' up, if ever he came to shore atall. "

"And the quarest part of it was that Joe McEvoy's ould cow thathe went after had legged herself up, somehow, on the rocks out ofreach, and niver a harm on her when they found her in the mornin'. But she'd been all of a could quiver ever since, and himself doubtedif she'd rightly git over it--might the divil mend her, and sheafter bein' the death of a fine young man. Sure, every sowl up atTullykillagin was rale annoyed about it. Even ould Biddy Duggan, that was as cross-tempered as a weasel, did be frettin' for thelad; and Joe McEvoy was sittin' crooched like an ould wet hen, overhis fire block out, that he hadn't the heart to be lightin'. "

Mrs. Doherty said she didn't know what talk they had of the Lordand the say and the ould cow; but she'd known well enough the wayit was when Mick niver come home last night. He'd just took offafter the souldiers, as he'd a great notion one time. 

She was, as may have been observed, rather a dull-witted woman, and proportionately hard to convince against her will. 

"A great notion intirely, " she said; "on'y she'd scarce havethought he'd go do such a thing on her in airnest. And I runnin'away indoors yisterday out of the heighth of the divarsion, whenthe band-music was a thrate to be hearin', just to see his bit ofsupper wouldn't be late on him. And the grand little pitaty-cakeI had for him; I may be throwin' it to the hins now, unless Mollymight fancy a bit; for we 'll not be apt to set eyes on him thisthree year. Och, wirra! and he that contint at home, and niver aword out of him about the souldierin' this long while. If it hadbeen poor Thady itself, 't would ha' been diff'rint; but Mick--I'dscarce ha' thought it of him; for he'd a dale of good-nature, Mrs. Geoghegan, ma'am. "

"He had so, tub-be sure, woman dear, " said Mrs. Geoghegan, "or hemight be sittin' warm in here this minnit. "

"The back of me hand to thim blamed ould throopers, " said Mrs. Doherty, "that sets the lads wild wid their thrampin' around. "

"Poor Mick would be better wid them than where he is now--God havemercy on his soul!" said a neighbour, solemnly. 

But Mick's mother continued to bewail herself: "And I missin' thebest of all the tunes they played, so Molly was tellin' me, for'fraid he 'd be kep' waitin' for his supper, and he comin' hometo me hungry; and now--There's a terrible len'th of time in threeyear. I wouldn't ha' believed he'd ha' done it on me. "

THE RIVAL DREAMERS

BY JOHN BANIM

Mr. Washington Irving has already given to the public a versionof an American legend, which, in a principal feature, bears somelikeness to the following transcript of a popular Irish one. Itmay, however, be interesting to show this very coincidence betweenthe descendants of a Dutch transatlantic colony and the nativepeasantry of Ireland, in the superstitious annals of both. Ourtale, moreover, will be found original in all its circumstances, that alluded to only excepted. 

Shamus Dempsey returned a silent, plodding, sorrowful man, thougha young one, to his poor home, after seeing laid in the gravehis aged, decrepit father. The last rays of the setting sun wereglorious, shooting through the folds of their pavilion of scarletclouds; the last song of the thrush, chanted from the bough nearestto his nest, was gladdening; the abundant though but half-maturedcrops around breathed of hope for the future. But Shamus's bosom wascovered with the darkness that inward sunshine alone can illumine. The chord that should respond to song and melody had snapped in it;for him the softly undulating fields of light-green wheat, or thesilken-surfaced patches of barley, made a promise in vain. He waspoor, penniless, friendless, and yet groaning under responsibilities;worn out by past and present suffering, and without a consolingprospect. His father's corpse had just been buried by a subscriptionamong his neighbours, collected in an old glove, a penny or ahalf-penny from each, by the most active of the humble community towhom his sad state was a subject of pity. In the wretched shed whichhe called "home, " a young wife lay on a truss of straw, listeningto the hungry cries of two little children, and awaiting her hourto become the weeping mother of a third. And the recollection thatbut for an act of domestic treachery experienced by his father andhimself, both would have been comfortable and respectable in theworld, aggravated the bitterness of the feeling in which Shamuscontemplated his lot. He could himself faintly call to mind a timeof early childhood, when he lived with his parents in a roomy house, eating and sleeping and dressing well, and surrounded by servantsand workmen; he further remembered that a day of great afflictioncame, upon which strange and rude persons forced their way into thehouse; and, for some cause his infant observation did not reach, father, servants, and workmen (his mother had just died) wereall turned out upon the road and doomed to seek the shelter of amean roof. But his father's discourse, since he gained the yearsof manhood, supplied Shamus with an explanation of all thesecircumstances, as follows. 

Old Dempsey had been the youngest son of a large farmer, who dividedhis lands between two elder children, and destined Shamus's fatherto the Church, sending him abroad for education, and, during itscourse, supplying him with liberal allowances. Upon the eve ofordination the young student returned home to visit his friends;was much noticed by neighbouring small gentry of each religion; atthe house of one of the opposite persuasion from his met a sisterof the proprietor, who had a fortune in her own right; abandonedhis clerical views for her smiles; eloped with her; married herprivately; incurred thereby the irremovable hostility of his ownfamily; but, after a short time, was received, along with his wife, by his generous brother-in-law, under whose guidance both becamereputably settled in the house to which Shamus's early recollectionspointed and where, till he was about six years old, he passedindeed a happy childhood. 

But, a little previous to this time, his mother's good brother diedunmarried, and was succeeded by another of her brothers, who hadunsuccessfully spent half his life as a lawyer in Dublin, and who, inheriting little of his predecessor's amiable character, soon showedhimself a foe to her and her husband, professedly on account ofher marriage with a Roman Catholic. He did not appear to theirvisit, shortly after his arrival in their neighbourhood, and henever condescended to return it. The affliction experienced by hissensitive sister from his conduct entailed upon her a prematureaccouchement, in which, giving birth to a lifeless babe, sheunexpectedly died. The event was matter of triumph rather than ofsorrow to her unnatural brother. For, in the first place, totallyunguarded against the sudden result, she had died intestate; inthe next place, he discovered that her private marriage had beencelebrated by a Roman Catholic priest, consequently could not, according to law, hold good; and again, could not give to her nominalhusband any right to her property, upon which both had hithertolived, and which was now the sole means of existence to Shamus'sfather. 

The lawyer speedily set to work upon these points, and with littledifficulty succeeded in supplying for Shamus's recollections a dayof trouble, already noticed. In fact, his father and he, now withouta shilling, took refuge in a distant cabin, where, by the sweat ofhis parent's brow, as a labourer in the fields, the ill-fated heroof this story was scantily fed and clothed, until maturer yearsenabled him to relieve the old man's hand of the spade and sickle, and in turn labour for their common wants. 

Shamus, becoming a little prosperous in the funeral we now seeShamus returning, and to such a home does he bend his heavy steps. 

If to know that the enemy of his father and mother did not thriveon the spoils of his oppression could have yielded Shamus anyconsolation in his lot, he had long ago become aware of circumstancescalculated to give this negative comfort. His maternal uncleenjoyed, indeed, his newly acquired property only a few years afterit came into his possession. Partly on account of his cruelty tohis relations, partly from a meanness and vulgarity of character, which soon displayed itself in his novel situation, and which, itwas believed, had previously kept him in the lowest walks of hisprofession as a Dublin attorney, he found himself neglected andshunned by the gentry of his neighbourhood. To grow richer thanthose who thus insulted him, to blazon abroad reports of his wealth, and to watch opportunities of using it to their injury, became themeans of revenge adopted by the parvenu. His legitimate income notpromising a rapid accomplishment of this plan, he ventured, usingprecautions that seemingly set suspicion at defiance, to engage insmuggling-adventures on a large scale, for which his proximity tothe coast afforded a local opportunity. Notwithstanding all hispettifogging cleverness, the ex-attorney was detected, however, inhis illegal traffic, and fined to an amount which swept away halfhis real property. Driven to desperation by the publicity of hisfailure, as well as by the failure itself, he tried another grandeffort to retrieve his fortune; was again surprised by the revenueofficers; in a personal struggle with them, at the head of hisband, killed one of their body; immediately absconded from Ireland;for the last twenty years had not been authentically heard of, but, it was believed, lived under an assumed name in London, derivingan obscure existence from some mean pursuit, of which the verynature enabled him to gratify propensities to drunkenness and othervices, learned during his first career in life. 

All this Shamus knew, though only from report, inasmuch as hisuncle had exiled himself while he was yet a child, and withoutpreviously having become known to the eyes of the nephew he had somuch injured. But if Shamus occasionally drew a bitter and almostsavage gratification from the downfall of his inhuman persecutor, no recurrence to the past could alleviate the misery of his presentsituation. 

He passed under one of the capacious open arches of the old abbey, and then entered his squalid shed reared against its wall, his heartas shattered and as trodden down as the ruins around him. No wordsof greeting ensued between him and his equally hopeless wife, asshe sat on the straw of her bed, rocking to sleep, with feeble andmournful cries, her youngest infant. He silently lighted a fireof withered twigs on his ready-furnished hearthstone; put to roastamong their embers a few potatoes which he had begged during theday; divided them between her and her crying children; and, asthe moon rising high in the heavens warned him that night assertedher full empire over the departed day, Shamus sank down upon thecouch from which his father's mortal remains had lately been borne, supperless himself, and dinnerless, too, but not hungry; at leastnot conscious or recollecting that he was. 

His wife and little ones soon slept soundly, but Shamus lay forhours inaccessible to nature's claims for sleep as well as forfood. From where he lay he could see, through the open front ofhis shed, out into the ruins abroad. After much abstraction in hisown thoughts, the silence, the extent, and the peculiar desolation ofthe scene, almost spiritualised by the magic effect of alternatemoonshine and darkness, of objects and of their parts, at last divertedhis mind, though not to relieve it. He remembered distinctly, forthe first time, where he was--an intruder among the dwellings ofthe dead; he called to mind, too, that the present was their hourfor revealing themselves among the remote loneliness and obscurityof their crumbling and intricate abode. As his eye fixed upon adistant stream of cold light or of blank shadow, either the waveringof some feathery herbage from the walls or the flitting of somenight-bird over the roofless aisle, made motion which went and cameduring the instant of his alarmed start, or else some disembodiedsleeper around had challenged and evaded his vision so rapidly asto baffle even the accompaniment of thought. Shamus would, however, recur, during these entrancing aberrations, to his more real causesfor terror; and he knew not, and to this day cannot distinctlytell, whether he waked or slept, when a new circumstance absorbedhis attention. The moon struck fully, under his propped roof, uponthe carved slab he had appropriated as a hearthstone; and turninghis eye to the spot, he saw the semblance of a man advanced inyears, though not very old, standing motionless, and very steadfastlyregarding him. The still face of the figure shone like marble inthe night-beam, without giving any idea of the solidity of thatmaterial; the long and deep shadows thrown by the forehead over theeyes left those unusally expressive features vague and uncertain. Upon the head was a close-fitting black cap, the dress was aloose-sleeved, plaited garment of white, descending to the ground, and faced and otherwise checkered with black, and girded roundthe loins; exactly the costume which Shamus had often studied ina little framed and glazed print, hung up in the sacristy of thehumble chapel recently built in the neighbourhood of the ruin by afew descendants of the great religious fraternity to whom, in its dayof pride, the abbey had belonged. As he returned very inquisitively, though, as he avers, not now in alarm, the fixed gaze of his midnightvisitor, a voice reached him, and he heard these strange words:

"Shamus Dempsey, go to London Bridge, and you will be a rich man. "

"How will that come about, your reverence?" cried Shamus, jumpingup from the straw. 

But the figure was gone; and stumbling among the black embers on theremarkable place where it had stood, he fell prostrate, experiencinga change of sensation and of observance of objects around, whichmight be explained by supposing a transition from a sleeping to awaking state of mind. 

The rest of the night he slept little, thinking of the advice hehad received, and of the mysterious personage who gave it. But heresolved to say nothing about his vision, particularly to his wife, lest, in her present state of health, the frightful story mightdistress her; and, as to his own conduct respecting it, he determinedto be guided by the future; in fact, he would wait to see if hiscounsellor came again. He did come again, appearing in the samespot at the same hour of the night, and wearing the same dress, though not the same expression of feature; for the shadowy browsnow slightly frowned, and a little severity mingled with the formersteadfastness of look. 

"Shamus Dempsey, why have you not gone to London Bridge, and yourwife so near the time when she will want what you are to get bygoing there? Remember, this is my second warning. "

"Musha, your reverence, an' what am I to do on Lunnon Bridge?"

Again he rose to approach the figure; again it eluded him. Again achange occurred in the quality of the interest with which he regardedthe admonition of his visitor. Again he passed a day of doubt as tothe propriety of undertaking what seemed to him little less thana journey to the world's end, without a penny in his pocket, andupon the eve of his wife's accouchement, merely in obedience to arecommendation which, according to his creed, was not yet sufficientlystrongly given, even were it under any circumstances to be adopted. For Shamus had often heard, and firmly believed, that a dream or avision instructing one how to procure riches ought to be experiencedthree times before it became entitled to attention. 

He lay down, however, half hoping that his vision might thusrecommend itself to his notice It did so. 

"Shamus Dempsey, " said the figure, looking more angry than ever, "you have not yet gone to London Bridge, although I hear your wifedying out to bid you go. And, remember, this s my third warning. "

"Why, then, tundher an' ouns, your reverence, just stop and tellme-"

Ere he could utter another word the holy visitant disappeared, ina real passion at Shamus's qualified curse; and at the same momenthis confused senses recognised the voice of his wife, sending upfrom her straw pallet the cries that betoken a mother's distanttravail. Exchaning a few words with her, he hurried away. Professedlycall up, at her cabin window, an old crane who sometimes attendedthe very poorest women in Nance Dempsey's situation. 

"Hurry to her, Noreen, acuishla, and do the best it's the willof God to let you do. And tell her from me, Noreen--" He stopped, drawing in his lip, and clutching his cudgel hard. 

"Shamus, what ails you, avick?" asked old Noreen; "what ails you, to make the tears run down in the gray o' the morning?"

"Tell her from me, " continued Shamus, "that it's from the bottom o'the heart I 'll pray, morning and evening, and fresh and fasting, maybe, to give her a good time of it; and to show her a face onthe poor child that's coming, likelier than the two that God sentafore it. And that I 'll be thinking o' picturing it to my ownmind, though I'll never see it far away. "

"Musha, Shamus, what are you speaking of?"

"No Matter, Noreen, only God be wid you, and wid her, and wid theweenocks; and tell her what I bid you. More-be-token, tell her thatpoor Shamus quits her in her throuble wid more love from the heartout than he had for her the first day we came together; and I'llcome back to her at any rate, sooner or later, richer or poorer, or as bare as I went; and maybe not so bare either. But God onlyknows. The top o' the morning to you, Noreen, and don't let herwant the mouthful o' praties while I'm on my thravels. For this, "added Shamus, as he bounded off, to the consternation of oldNoreen--"this is the very morning and the very minute that, ifI mind the dhrame at all at all, I ought to mind it; ay, withoutever turning back to get a look from her, that 'ud kill the heartin my body entirely. "

Without much previous knowledge of the road he was to take, Shamuswalked and begged his way along the coast to the town where hemight hope to embark for England. Here the captain of a merchantmanagreed to let him work his passage to Bristol, whence he againwalked and begged into London. 

Without taking rest or food, Shamus proceeded to London Bridge, often put out of his course by wrong directions, and as oftenby forgetting and misconceiving true ones. It was with old LondonBridge that Shamus had to do (not the old one last pulled down, butits more reverend predecessor), which, at that time, was linedat either side by quaintly fashioned houses, mostly occupiedby shopkeepers, so that the space between presented perhaps thegreatest thoroughfare then known in the Queen of Cities. And atabout two o'clock in the afternoon, barefooted, ragged, fevered, and agitated, Shamus mingled with the turbid human stream, thatroared and chafed over the as restless and as evanescent streamwhich buffeted the arches of old London Bridge. In a situation sonovel to him, so much more extraordinary in the reality than hisanticipation could have fancied, the poor and friendless strangerfelt overwhelmed. A sense of forlornness, of insignificance, andof terror seized upon his faculties. From the stare or the sneersor the jostle of the iron-nerved crowd he shrank with glances ofwild timidity, and with a heart as wildly timid as were his looks. For some time he stood or staggered about, unable to collect histhoughts, or to bring to mind what was his business there. But whenShamus became able to refer to the motive of his pauper journeyfrom his native solitudes into the thick of such a scene, it wasno wonder that the zeal of superstition totally subsided amid theastounding truths he witnessed. In fact, the bewildered simpletonnow regarded his dream as the merest chimera. Hastily escapingfrom the thoroughfare, he sought out some wretched place of reposesuited to his wretched condition, and there mooned himself asleep, in self-accusations at the thought of poor Nance at home, and inutter despair of all his future prospects. 

At daybreak the next morning he awoke, a little less agitated, butstill with no hope. He was able, however, to resolve upon the bestcourse of conduct now left open to him; and he arranged immediatelyto retrace his steps to Ireland, as soon as he should have beggedsufficient alms to speed him a mile on the road. With this intenthe hastily issued forth, preferring to challenge the notice ofchance passengers, even at the early hour of dawn, than to ventureagain, in the middle of the day, among the dreaded crowds of thevast city. Very few, indeed, were the passers-by whom Shamus metduring his straggling and stealthy walk through the streets, andthose of a description little able or willing to afford a half-pennyto his humbled, whining suit, and to his spasmed lip and wateryeye. In what direction he went Shamus did not know; but at last hefound himself entering upon the scene of his yesterday's terror. Now, however, it presented nothing to renew its former impression. The shops at the sides of the bridge were closed, and the occasionalstragglers of either sex who came along inspired Shamus, little ashe knew of a great city, with aversion rather than with dread. Inthe quietness and security of his present position, Shamus was bothcourageous and weak enough again to summon up his dream. 

"Come, " he said, "since I AM on Lunnon Bridge, I 'll walk overevery stone of it, and see what good that will do. "

He valiantly gained the far end. Here one house, of all that stoodupon the bridge, began to be opened; it was a public-house, and, bya sidelong glance as he passed, Shamus thought that, in the personof a red-cheeked, red-nosed, sunken-eyed, elderly man, who tookdown the window-shutters, he recognised the proprietor. This personlooked at Shamus, in return, with peculiar scrutiny. The wandererliked neither his regards nor the expression of his countenance, and quickened his steps onward until he cleared the bridge. 

"But I 'll walk it over at the other side now, " he bethought, afterallowing the publican time to finish opening his house and retireout of view. 

But, repassing the house, the man still appeared, leaning againsthis door-jamb, and as if waiting for Shamus's return, whom, uponthis second occasion, he eyed more attentively than before. 

"Sorrow's in him, " thought Shamus, "have I two heads on me, thatI'm such a sight to him? But who cares about his pair of ferreteyes? I 'll thrudge down the middle stone of it, at any rate!"

Accordingly, he again walked toward the public-house, keeping themiddle of the bridge. 

"Good-morrow, friend, " said the publican, as Shamus a third timepassed his door. 

"Sarvant kindly, sir, " answered Shamus, respectfully pulling downthe brim of his hat, and increasing his pace. 

"Am early hour you choose for a morning walk, " continued his newacquaintance. 

"Brave and early, faix, sir, " said Shamus, still hurrying off. 

"Stop a bit, " resumed the publican. Shamus stood still. "I seeyou're a countryman of mine --an Irishman; I'd know one of you ata look, though I'm a long time out of the country. And you're notvery well off on London Bridge this morning, either. "

"No, indeed, sir, " replied Shamus, beginning to doubt his skill inphysiognomy, at the stranger's kind address; "but as badly off asa body 'ud wish to be. "

"Come over to look for the work?"

"Nien, sir; but come out this morning to beg a ha'-penny, to sendme a bit of the road home. "

"Well, here's a silver sixpence without asking. And you'd bettersit on the bench by the door here, and eat a crust and a cut ofcheese, and drink a drop of good ale, to break your fast. "

With profuse thanks Shamus accepted this kind invitation, blaminghimself at heart for having allowed his opinion of the charitablepublican to be guided by the expression of the man's features. "Handsome is that handsome does, " was Shamus's self-correctingreflection. 

While eating his bread and cheese and drinking his strong ale, they conversed freely together, and Shamus's heart opened more andmore to his benefactor. The publican repeatedly asked him what hadbrought him to London; and though, half out of prudence and halfout of shame, the dreamer at first evaded the question, he felt itat last impossible to refuse a candid answer to his generous friend. 

"Why, then, sir, only I am such a big fool for telling it to you, it's what brought me to Lunnon Bridge was a quare dhrame I had athome in Ireland, that tould me just to come here, and I'd find apot of goold. " For such was the interpretation given by Shamus tothe vague admonition of his visionary counsellor. 

His companion burst into a loud laugh, saying after it:

"Pho, pho, man, don't be so silly as to put faith in nonsensicaldreams of that kind. Many a one like it I have had, if I would bothermy head with them. Why, within the last ten days, while you weredreaming of finding a pot of gold on London Bridge, I was dreamingof finding a pot of gold in Ireland. "

"Ullaloo, and were you, sir?" asked Shamus, laying down his emptypint. 

"Ay, indeed; night after night an old friar with a pale face, anddressed all in white and black, and a black skull-cap on his head, came to me in a dream, and bid me go to Ireland, to a certain spotin a certain county that I know very well, and under the slab ofhis tomb, that has a cross and some old Romish letters on it, inan old abbey I often saw before now, I'd find a treasure that wouldmake me a rich man all the days of my life. "

"Musha, sir, " asked Shamus, scarce able prudently to control hisagitation, " and did he tell you that the treasure lay buried thereever so long under the open sky and the ould walls?"

"No; but he told me I was to find the slab covered in by a shedthat a poor man had lately built inside the abbey for himself andhis family. "

"Whoo, by the powers!" shouted Shamus, at last thrown off his guardby the surpassing joy derived from this intelligence, as well as bythe effects of the ale; and at the same time he jumped up, cuttinga caper with his legs, and flourishing his shillalah. 

"Why, what's the matter with you?" asked his friend, glancing athim a frowning and misgiving look. 

"We ax pardon, sir. " Shamus rallied his prudence. "An', sure, sorrow a thing is the matter wid me, only the dhrop, I believe, made me do it, as it ever and always does, good luck to it for thesame. An' isn't what we were spaking about the biggest raumaush[Footnote: Nonsense. ] undher the sun, sir? Only it's the laste bitin the world quare to me how you'd have the dhrame about your owncountry, that you didn't see for so many years, sir--for twentylong years, I think you said, sir?" Shamus had now a new object inputting his sly question. 

"If I said so, I forgot, " answered the publican, his suspicionsof Shamus at an end. "But it is about twenty years, indeed, sinceI left Ireland. "

"And by your speech, sir, and your dacency, I 'll engage you werein a good way in the poor place afore you left it?"

"You guess correctly, friend. " (The publican gave way to vanity. )"Before misfortunes came over me, I possessed, along with a goodhundred acres besides, the very ground that the old ruin I saw inthe foolish dream I told you stands upon. "

"An' so did my curse-o'-God's uncle, " thought Shamus, his heart'sblood beginning to boil, though, with a great effort, he kepthimself seemingly cool. "And this is the man fornent me, if heanswers another word I 'll ax him. Faix, sir, and sure that makesyour dhrame quarer than ever; and the ground the ould abbey is on, sir, and the good acres round it, did you say they lay somewherein the poor county myself came from?"

"What county is that, friend?" demanded the publican, again witha studious frown. 

"The ould County Monaghan, sure, sir, " replied Shamus, verydeliberately. 

"No, but the county of Clare, " answered his companion. 

"Was it?" screamed Shamus, again springing up. The cherished hatredof twenty years imprudently bursting out, his uncle lay stretchedat his feet, after a renewed flourish of his cudgel. "And do youknow who you are telling it to this morning? Did you ever hearthat the sisther you kilt left a bit of a gorsoon behind her, thatone day or other might overhear you? Ay, " he continued, keeping downthe struggling man, "IT IS poor Shamus Dempsey that's kneeling byyou; ay, and that has more to tell you. The shed built over the oldfriar's tombstone was built by the hands you feel on your throttle, and that tombstone is his hearthstone; and, " continued Shamus, beginning to bind the prostrate man with a rope snatched froma bench near them, "while you lie here awhile, an' no one to helpyou, in the cool of the morning, I'll just take a start of you onthe road home, to lift the flag and get the threasure; and followme if you dare! You know there's good money bid for your head inIreland--so here goes. Yes, faith, and wid this-THIS to help me onthe way!" He snatched up a heavy purse which had fallen from hisuncle's pocket in the struggle. "And sure, there's neither hurt norharm in getting back a little of a body's own from you. A brightgoodmorning, uncle dear!"

Shamus dragged his manacled relative into the shop, quickly shut toand locked the door, flung the key over the house into the Thames, and the next instant was running at headlong speed. 

He was not so deficient in the calculations of common sense as tothink himself yet out of his uncle's power. It appeared, indeed, pretty certain that, neither for the violence done to his personnor for the purse appropriated by his nephew, the outlawed murdererwould raise a hue and cry after one who, aware of his identity, could deliver him up to the laws of his country. But Shamus feltcertain that it would be a race between him and his uncle for thetreasure that lay under the friar's tombstone. His simple naturesupplied no stronger motive for a pursuit on the part of a man whoselife now lay in the breath of his mouth. Full of his conviction, however, Shamus saw he had not a moment to lose until the roof ofhis shed in the old abbey again sheltered him. So, freely making useof his uncle's guineas, he purchased a strong horse in the outskirtsof London, and, to the surprise if not under heavy suspicions ofthe vender, set off at a gallop upon the road by which he had theday before gained the great metropolis. 

A ship was ready to sail at Bristol for Ireland; but, to Shamus'sdiscomfiture, she waited for a wind. He got aboard, however, and inthe darksome and squalid hold often knelt down, and, with claspedhands and panting breast, petitioned Heaven for a favourable breeze. But from morning until evening the wind remained as he had foundit, and Shamus despaired. His uncle, meantime, might have reachedsome other port, and embarked for their country. In the depthof his anguish he heard a brisk bustle upon deck, clambered upto investigate its cause, and found the ship's sails already halfunfurled to a wind that promised to bear him to his native shoresby the next morning. The last light of day yet lingered in theheavens; he glanced, now under way, to the quay of Bristol. A groupwho had been watching the departure of the vessel turned round tonote the approach to them of a man, who ran furiously toward theplace where they stood, pointing after her, and evidently speakingwith vehemence, although no words reached Shamus's ear. Neitherwas his eye sure of this person's features, but his heart read themdistinctly. A boat shot from the quay; the man stood up in it, andits rowers made a signal. 

Shamus stepped to the gangway, as if preparing to hurl his pursuerinto the sea. The captain took a speaking-trumpet, and informingthe boat that he could not stop an instant, advised her to waitfor another merchantman, which would sail in an hour. And duringand after his speech his vessel ploughed cheerily on, making asmuch way as she was adapted to accomplish. 

Shamus's bosom felt lightened of its immediate terror, but notfreed of apprehension for the future. The ship that was to sailin an hour haunted his thoughts; he did not leave the deck, and, although the night proved very dark, his anxious eyes were never turnedfrom the English coast. Unusual fatigue and want of sleep now andthen overpowered him, and his senses swam in a wild and snatchingslumber; but from this he would start, crying out and clinging tothe cordage, as the feverish dream of an instant presented him withthe swelling canvas of a fast-sailing ship, which came, suddenlybursting through the gloom of midnight, alongside of his own. Morningdawned, really to unveil to him the object of his fears followingalmost in the wake of her rival. He glanced in the opposite direction, and beheld the shores of Ireland; in another hour he jumped uponthem; but his enemy's face watched him from the deck of the companionvessel, now not more than a few ropes' lengths distant. 

Shamus mounted a second good horse, and spurred toward home. Oftendid he look back, but without seeing any cause for increased alarm. As yet, however, the road had been level and winding, and thereforecould not allow him to span much of it at a glance. After noon itascended a high and lengthened hill surrounded by wastes of bog. As he gained the summit of this hill, and again looked back, ahorseman appeared, sweeping to its foot. Shamus galloped at fullspeed down the now quickly falling road; then along its levelcontinuation for about a mile; and then up another eminence, morelengthened, though not so steep as the former; and from it still helooked back, and caught the figure of the horseman breaking overthe line of the hill he had passed. For hours such was the characterof the chase, until the road narrowed and began to wind amid anuncultivated and uninhabited mountain wilderness. Here Shamus'shorse tripped and fell; the rider, little injured, assisted himto his legs, and, with lash and spur, re-urged him to pursue hiscourse. The animal went forward in a last effort, and for stillanother span of time well befriended his rider. A rocky valley, through which both had been galloping, now opened at its fartherend, presenting to Shamus's eye, in the distance, the sloping ground, and the ruin which, with its mouldering walls, encircled his poorhome; and the setting sun streamed golden rays through the windowsand rents of the old abbey. 

The fugitive gave a weak cry of joy, and lashed his beast again. The cry seemed to be answered by a shout; and a second time, aftera wild plunge, the horse fell, now throwing Shamus off with a forcethat left him stunned. And yet he heard the hoofs of another horsecome thundering down the rocky way; and, while he made a fainteffort to rise on his hands and look at his pursuer, the horse andhorseman were very near, and the voice of his uncle cried, "Stand!"at the same time that the speaker fired a pistol, of which the ballstruck a stone at Shamus's foot. The next moment his uncle, havingleft his saddle, stood over him, presenting a second pistol, andhe spoke in a low but distinct voice. 

"Spawn of a beggar! This is not merely for the chance of richesgiven by our dreams, though it seems, in the teeth of all I everthought, that the devil tells truth at last. No, nor it is notquite for the blow; but it IS to close the lips that, with a singleword, can kill me. You die to let me live!"

"Help!" aspirated Shamus's heart, turning itself to Heaven. "Helpme but now, not for the sake of the goold either, but for the sakeof them that will be left on the wild world widout me; for themhelp me, great God!"

Hitherto his weakness and confusion had left him passive. Beforehis uncle spoke the last words, his silent prayer was offered, andShamus had jumped upon his assailant. They struggled and draggedeach other down. Shamus felt the muzzle of the pistol at his breast;heard it snap--but only snap; he seized and mastered it, and oncemore the uncle was at the mercy of his nephew. Shamus's hand wasraised to deal a good blow; but he checked himself, and addressedthe almost senseless ears of his captive. 

"No; you're my mother's blood, and a son of hers will never drawit from your heart; but I can make sure of you again; stop a bit. "

He ran to his own prostrate horse, took off its bridle and itssaddle-girth, and with both secured his uncle's limbs beyond allpossibility of the struggler being able to escape from their control. 

"There, " resumed Shamus; "lie there till we have time to send anould friend to see you, that, I'll go bail, will take good care ofyour four bones. And do you know where I'm going now? You touldme, on Lunnon Bridge, that you knew THAT, at least, " pointing tothe abbey; "ay, and the quare ould hearthstone that's to be foundin it. And so, look at this, uncle, honey. " He vaulted upon hisrelative's horse. "I'm just goin' to lift it off o' the barrel-potfull of good ould goold, and you have only to cry halves, andyou'll get it, as, sure as that the big divil is in the town youcame from. "

Nance Dempsey was nursing her new-born babe, sitting up in herstraw, and doing very well after her late illness, when old Noreentottered in from the front of the ruin to tell her that "the bodythey were just speaking about was driving up the hill mad, like asif't was his own sperit in great throuble. " And the listener hadnot recovered from her surprise when Shamus ran into the shed, flunghimself, kneeling, by her side, caught her in his arms, then seizedher infant, covered it with kisses, and then, roughly throwing itin her lap, turned to the fireplace, raised one of the rocky seatslying near it, poised the ponderous mass over the hearthstone, andshivered into pieces, with one crash, that solid barrier betweenhim and his visionary world of wealth. 

"It's cracked he is out an' out of a certainty, " said Nance, lookingterrified at her husband. 

"Nothing else am I, " shouted Shamus, after groping under the brokenslab; "an', for a token, get along wid yourself out of this, ouldgran!"

He started up and seized her by the shoulder. Noreen remonstrated. He stooped for a stone; she ran; he pursued her to the arches ofthe ruin. She stopped half-way down the descent. He pelted her withclods to the bottom, and along a good piece of her road homeward, and then danced back into his wife's presence. 

"Now, Nance, " he cried, "now that we're by ourselves, what noiseis this like?"

"And he took out han'fuls after han'fuls of the ould goold aforeher face, my dear, " added the original narrator of this story. 

"An' after the gaugers and their crony, Ould Nick, ran off wid theuncle of him, Nance and he and the childer lived together in theirfather's and mother's house; and if they didn't live and die happy, I wish that you and I may. "

NEAL MALONE

BY WILLIAM CARLETON

There never was a greater-souled or doughtier tailor than littleNeal Malone. Though but four feet four in height, he paced theearth with the courage and confidence of a giant; nay, one wouldhave imagined that he walked as if he feared the world itselfwas about to give way under him. Let no one dare to say in futurethat a tailor is but the ninth part of a man. That reproach hasbeen gloriously taken away from the character of the cross-leggedcorporation by Neal Malone. He has wiped it off like a stain fromthe collar of a secondhand coat; he has pressed this wrinkle out ofthe lying front of antiquity; he has drawn together this rent in therespectability of his profession. No. By him who was breeches-makerto the gods, --that is, except, like Highlanders, they eschewedinexpressibles, --by him who cut Jupiter's frieze jocks for winter, and eke by the bottom of his thimble, we swear that Neal Malonewas MORE than the ninth part of a man. 

Setting aside the Patagonians, we maintain that two thirds of mortalhumanity were comprised in Neal; and perhaps we might venture toassert that two thirds of Neal's humanity were equal to six thirdsof another man's. It is right well known that Alexander the Greatwas a little man, and we doubt whether, had Alexander the Greatbeen bred to the tailoring business, he would have exhibited somuch of the hero as Neal Malone. Neal was descended from a fightingfamily, who had signalised themselves in as many battles as everany single hero of antiquity fought. His father, his grandfather, and his great-grandfather were all fighting men, and his ancestorsin general, up, probably, to Con of the Hundred Battles himself. No wonder, therefore, that Neal's blood should cry out against thecowardice of his calling; no wonder that he should be an epitomeof all that was valorous and heroic in a peaceable man, for weneglected to inform the reader that Neal, though "bearing no basemind, " never fought any man in his own person. That, however, deducted nothing from his courage. If he did not fight it was simplybecause he found cowardice universal. No man would engage him; hisspirit blazed in vain; his thirst for battle was doomed to remainunquenched, except by whisky, and this only increased it. Inshort, he could find no foe. He has often been known to challengethe first cudgel-players and pugilists of the parish, to provokemen of fourteenstone weight, and to bid mortal defiance to factionheroes of all grades-but in vain. There was that in him whichtold them that an encounter with Neal would strip them of theirlaurels. Neal saw all this with a lofty indignation; he deploredthe degeneracy of the times, and thought it hard that the descendantof such a fighting family should be doomed to pass through lifepeaceably, whilst so many excellent rows and riots took place aroundhim. It was a calamity to see every man's head broken but his own;a dismal thing to observe his neighbours go about with their bonesin bandages, yet his untouched, and his friends beat black andblue, whilst his own cuticle remained unscoloured. 

"Blur an' agers!" exclaimed Neal one day, when half tipsy in thefair, "am I never to get a bit o' figtin'? Is there no cowardlyspalpeen to stand afore Neal Malone? Be this an' be that, I'mblue-mowlded for want of a batin'! I'm disgracin' my relationsby the life I'm ladin'! Will none o' ye fight me aither for love, money, or whisky, frind or inimy, an' bad luck to ye? I don't carea traneen which, only out o' pure frindship, let us have a morselo' the rale kick-up, 't any rate. Frind or inimy, I say agin, if youregard me; sore THAT makes no differ, only let us have the fight. "

This excellent heroism was all wasted; Neal could not find a singleadversary. Except he divided himself like Hotspur, and went tobuffets one hand against the other, there was no chance of a fight;no person to be found sufficiently magnanimous to encounter thetailor. On the contrary, every one of his friends--or, in otherwords, every man in the parish--was ready to support him. He wasclapped on the back until his bones were nearly dislocated in hisbody, and his hand shaken until his arm lost its cunning at theneedle for half a week afterward. This, to be sure, was a bitterbusiness, a state of being past endurance. Every man was hisfriend--no man was his enemy. A desperate position for any personto find himself in, but doubly calamitous to a martial tailor. 

Many a dolourous complaint did Neal make upon the misfortune ofhaving none to wish him ill; and what rendered this hardship doublyoppressive was the unlucky fact that no exertions of his, howeveroffensive, could procure him a single foe. In vain did he insult, abuse, and malign all his acquaintances. In vain did he fatherupon them all the rascality and villainy he could think of; helied against them with a force and originality that would have mademany a modern novelist blush for want of invention--but all to nopurpose. The world for once became astonishingly Christian; it paidback all his efforts to excite its resentment with the purest ofcharity; when Neal struck it on the one cheek, it meekly turnedunto him the other. It could scarcely be expected that Neal wouldbear this. To have the whole world in friendship with a man isbeyond doubt an affliction. Not to have the face of a single enemyto look upon would decidedly be considered a deprivation of manyagreeable sensations by most people as well as by Neal Malone. Letwho might sustain a loss or experience a calamity, it was a matterof indifference to Neal. They were only his friends, and he troubledneither his head nor his heart about them. 

Heaven help us! There is no man without his trials; and Neal, thereader perceives, was not exempt from his. What did it avail himthat he carried a cudgel ready for all hostile contingencies, orknit his brows and shook his kippeen at the fiercest of his fightingfriends? The moment he appeared they softened into downright cordiality. His presence was the signal of peace; for, notwithstanding hisunconquerable propensity to warfare, he went abroad as the geniusof unanimity, though carrying in his bosom the redoubtable dispositionof a warrior; just as the sun, though the source of light himself, is said to be dark enough at bottom. 

It could not be expected that Neal, with whatever fortitude hemight bear his other afflictions, could bear such tranquillity likea hero. To say that he bore it as one would be basely to surrenderhis character; for what hero ever bore a state of tranquillitywith courage? It affected his cutting out! It produced what Burtoncalls "a windie melancholie, " which was nothing else than anaccumulation of courage that had no means of escaping, if couragecan, without indignity, be ever said to escape. He sat uneasy onhis lap-board. Instead of cutting out soberly, he flourished hisscissors as if he were heading a faction; he wasted much chalk byscoring his cloth in wrong places, and even caught his hot goosewithout a holder. These symptoms alarmed his friends, who persuadedhim to go to a doctor. Neal went to satisfy them; but he knew thatno prescription could drive the courage out of him, that he wastoo far gone in heroism to be made a coward of by apothecary stuff. Nothing in the pharmacopoeia could physic him into a pacific state. His disease was simply the want of an enemy, and an unaccountablesuperabundance of friendship on the part of his acquaintances. How could a doctor remedy this by a prescription? Impossible. Thedoctor, indeed, recommended blood-letting; but to lose blood in apeaceable manner was not only cowardly, but a bad cure for courage. Neal declined it: he would lose no blood for any man until he couldnot help it; which was giving the character of a hero at a singletouch. HIS blood was not to be thrown away in this manner; theonly lancet ever applied to his relations was the cudgel, and Nealscorned to abandon the principles of his family. 

His friends, finding that he reserved his blood for more heroicpurposes than dastardly phlebotomy, knew not what to do with him. His perpetual exclamation was, as we have already stated, "I'mblue-mowlded for want of a batin'!" They did everything in theirpower to cheer him with the hope of a drubbing; told him he livedin an excellent country for a man afflicted with his malady; andpromised, if it were at all possible, to create him a private enemyor two, who, they hoped in heaven, might trounce him to some purpose. 

This sustained him for a while; but as day after day passed andno appearance of action presented itself, he could not choose butincrease in courage. His soul, like a sword-blade too long in thescabbard, was beginning to get fuliginous by inactivity. He lookedupon the point of his own needle and the bright edge of his scissorswith a bitter pang when he thought of the spirit rusting withinhim; he meditated fresh insults, studied new plans, and hunted outcunning devices for provoking his acquaintances to battle, untilby degrees he began to confound his own brain and to commit moregrievous oversights in his business than ever. Sometimes he sent hometo one person a coat with the legs of a pair of trousers attachedto it for sleeves, and despatched to another the arms of the aforesaidcoat tacked together as a pair of trousers. Sometimes the coat wasmade to button behind instead of before; and he frequently placedthe pockets in the lower part of the skirts, as if he had been inleague with cutpurses. 

This was a melancholy situation, and his friends pitied himaccordingly. 

"Don't be cast down, Neal, " said they; "your friends feel for you, poor fellow. "

"Divil carry my frinds, " replied Neal; "sure, there's not one o'yez frindly enough to be my inimy. Tare an' ouns! what'll I do?I'm blue-mowlded for want of a batin'!"

Seeing that their consolation was thrown away upon him, they resolvedto leave him to his fate; which they had no sooner done then Nealhad thoughts of taking to the Skiomachia as a last remedy. In thismood he looked with considerable antipathy at his own shadow forseveral nights; and it is not to be questioned but that some hardbattles would have taken place between them had it not been forthe cunning of the shadow, which declined to fight him in any otherposition than with its back to the wall. This occasioned him topause, for the wall was a fearful antagonist, inasmuch as it knewnot when it was beaten; but there was still an alternative left. He went to the garden one clear day about noon, and hoped to havea bout with the shade free from interruption. Both approached, apparently eager for the combat and resolved to conquer or die, when a villainous cloud, happening to intercept the light, gavethe shadow an opportunity of disappearing, and Neal found himselfonce more without an opponent. 

"It's aisy known, " said Neal, "you haven't the BLOOD in you, oryou'd come to the scratch like a man. "

He now saw that fate was against him, and that any further hostilitytoward the shadow was only a tempting of Providence. He lost hishealth, spirits, and everything but his courage. His countenancebecame pale and peaceful-looking; the bluster departed from him;his body shrank up like a withered parsnip. Thrice was he compelledto take in his clothes, and thrice did he ascertain that much of histime would be necessarily spent in pursuing his retreating personthrough the solitude of his almost deserted garments. 

God knows it is difficult to form a correct opinion upon a situationso parodoxical as Neal's was. To be reduced to skin and bone bythe downright friendship of the world was, as the sagacious readerwill admit, next to a miracle. We appeal to the conscience of anyman who finds himself without an enemy whether he be not a greaterskeleton than the tailor; we will give him fifty guineas provided hecan show a calf to his leg. We know he could not; for the tailorhad none, and that was because he had not an enemy. No man infriendship with the world ever has calves to his legs. To sum upall in a parodox of our own invention, for which we claim the fullcredit of originality, we now assert that more men have risen in theworld by the injury of their enemies than have risen by the kindnessof their friends. You may take this, reader, in any sense; apply itto hanging if you like; it is still immutably and immovably true. 

One day Neal sat cross-legged, as tailors usually sit, in the actof pressing a pair of breeches; his hands were placed, backs up, upon the handle of his goose, and his chin rested upon the backsof his hands. To judge from his sorrowful complexion, one wouldsuppose that he sat rather to be sketched as a picture of misery orof heroism in distress than for the industrious purpose of pressingthe seams of a garment. There was a great deal of New BurlingtonStreet pathos in his countenance; his face, like the times, wasrather out of joint; "the sun was just setting, and his goldenbeams fell, with a saddened splendor, athwart the tailor's--" Thereader may fill up the picture. 

In this position sat Neal when Mr. O'Connor, the schoolmaster, whose inexpressibles he was turning for the third time, enteredthe workshop. Mr. O'Connor himself was as finished a picture ofmisery as the tailor. There was a patient, subdued kind of expressionin his face which indicated a very fair portion of calamity; hiseye seemed charged with affliction of the first water; on each sideof his nose might be traced two dry channels, which, no doubt, werefull enough while the tropical rains of his countenance lasted. Altogether, to conclude from appearances, it was a dead match inaffliction between him and the tailor; both seemed sad, fleshless, and unthriving. 

"Misther O'Connor, " said the tailor, when the schoolmaster entered, "won't you be pleased to sit down?"

Mr. O'Connor sat; and, after wiping his forehead, laid his hatupon the lap-board, put his half-handkerchief in his pocket, andlooked upon the tailor. The tailor, in return, looked upon Mr. O'Connor; but neither of them spoke for some minutes. Neal, in fact, appeared to be wrapped up in his own misery, and Mr. O'Connor inhis; or, as we often have much gratuitous sympathy for the distressesof our friends, we question but the tailor was wrapped up in Mr. O'Connor's misery, and Mr. O'Connor in the tailor's. 

Mr. O'Connor at length said: "Neal, are my inexpressibles finished?"

"I am now pressin' your inexpressibles, " replied Neal; "but, be mysowl, Mr. O'Connor, it's not your inexpressibles I'm thinkin' of. I'm not the ninth part o' what I was. I'd hardly make paddin' fora collar now. "

"Are you able to carry a staff still, Neal?"

"I've a light hazel one that's handy, " said the tailor, "but where'sthe use o' carryin' it whin I can get no one to fight wid? Sure, I'm disgracin' my relations by the life I'm ladin'. I 'll go tomy grave widout ever batin' a man or bein' bate myself; that's thevexation. Divil the row ever I was able to kick up in my life; sothat I'm fairly blue-mowlded for want of a batin'. But if you havepatience--"

"Patience!" said Mr. O'Connor, with a shake of the head that wasperfectly disastrous even to look at, --"patience, did you say, Neal?"

"Ay, " said Neal, "an' be my sowl, if you deny that I said patienceI 'll break your head!"

"Ah, Neal, " returned the other, "I don't deny it; for, though I'mteaching philosophy, knowledge, and mathematics every day in mylife, yet I'm learning patience myself both night and day. No, Neal; I have forgotten to deny anything. I have not been guilty ofa contradiction, out of my own school, for the last fourteen years. I once expressed the shadow of a doubt about twelve years ago, butever since I have abandoned even doubting. That doubt was the lastexpiring effort at maintaining my domestic authority--but I sufferedfor it. "

"Well, " said Neal, "if you have patience, I 'll tell you whatafflicts me from beginnin' to endin'. "

"I WILL have patience, " said Mr. O'Connor; and he accordingly hearda dismal and indignant tale from the tailor. 

"You have told me that fifty times over, " said Mr. O'Connor, afterhearing the story. "Your spirit is too martial for a pacific life. If you follow my advice, I will teach you how to ripple the calm currentof your existence to some purpose. MARRY A WIFE. For twenty-fiveyears I have given instruction in three branches, namely, philosophy, knowledge, and mathematics. I am also well versed in matrimony, and I declare that, upon my misery and by the contents of all myafflictions, it is my solemn and melancholy opinion that, if you marrya wife, you will, before three months pass over your concatenatedstate, not have a single complaint to make touching a superabundanceof peace or tranquillity or a love of fighting. "

"Do you mane to say that any woman would make me afeard?" saidthe tailor, deliberately rising up and getting his cudgel. "I 'llthank you merely to go over the words agin, till I thrasy you widinan inch of your life. That's all"

"Neal, " said the schoolmaster, meekly, "I won't fight; I have beentoo often subdued ever to presume on the hope of a single victory. My spirit is long since evaporated; I am like one of your ownshreds, a mere selvage. Do you not know how much my habilimentshave shrunk in even within the last five years? Hear me, Neal, andvenerate my words as if they proceeded from the lips of a prophet. If you wish to taste the luxury of being subdued--if you are, asyou say, blue-moulded for want of a beating, and sick at heart ofa peaceful existence--why, marry a wife. Neal, send my breecheshome with all haste, for they are wanted, you understand. Farewell. "

Mr. O'Connor, having thus expressed himself, departed; and Nealstood, with the cudgel in his hand, looking at the door out ofwhich he passed, with an expression of fierceness, contempt, andreflection strongly blended on the ruins of his once heroic visage. 

Many a man has happiness within his reach if he but knew it. The tailor had been hitherto miserable because he pursued a wrongobject. The schoolmaster, however, suggested a train of thoughtupon which Neal now fastened with all the ardour of a chivalroustemperament. Nay, be wondered that the family spirit should haveso completely seized upon the fighting side of his heart as topreclude all thoughts of matrimony; for he could not but rememberthat his relations were as ready for marriage as for fighting. Todoubt this would have been to throw a blot upon his own escutcheon. He therefore very prudently asked himself to whom, if he did notmarry, should he transmit his courage. He was a single man, and, dying as such, he would be the sole depository of his own valor, which, like Junius's secret, must perish with him. If he could haveleft it as a legacy to such of his friends as were most remarkablefor cowardice, why, the case would be altered: but this was impossible, and he had now no other means of preserving it to posterity thanby creating a posterity to inherit it. He saw, too, that the worldwas likely to become convulsed. Wars, as everybody knew, werecertain to break out; and would it not be an excellent opportunityfor being father to a colonel, or perhaps a general, that mightastonish the world?

The change visible in Neal after the schoolmaster's last visitabsolutely thunderstruck all who knew him. The clothes which hehad rashly taken in to fit his shrivelled limbs were once more letout. The tailor expanded with a new spirit; his joints ceased tobe supple, as in the days of his valor; his eye became less fierybut more brilliant. From being martial, he got desperately gallant;but, somehow, he could not afford to act the hero and lover bothat the same time. This, perhaps, would be too much to expect froma tailor. His policy was better. He resolved to bring all hisavailable energy to bear upon the charms of whatever fair nymph heshould select for the honour of matrimony; to waste his spirit infighting would, therefore, be a deduction from the single purposein view. 

The transition from war to love is by no means so remarkable as wemight at first imagine. We quote Jack Falstaff in proof of this;or, if the reader be disposed to reject our authority, then wequote Ancient Pistol himself--both of whom we consider as the mostfinished specimens of heroism that ever carried a safe skin. Acreswould have been a hero had he worn gloves to prevent the couragefrom oozing out at his palms, or not felt such an unlucky antipathyto the "snug lying in the Abbey"; and as for Captain Bobadil, henever had an opportunity of putting his plan for vanquishing anarmy into practice. We fear, indeed, that neither his characternor Ben Jonson's knowledge of human nature is properly understood;for it certainly could not be expected that a man whose spiritglowed to encounter a whole host could, without tarnishing hisdignity, if closely pressed, condescend to fight an individual. But as these remarks on courage may be felt by the reader as aninvidious introduction of a subject disagreeable to him, we begto hush it for the present and return to the tailor. 

No sooner had Neal begun to feel an inclination to matrimony thanhis friends knew that his principles had veered by the change nowvisible in his person and deportment. They saw he had ratted fromcourage and joined love. Heretofore his life had been all winter, darkened by storm and hurricane. The fiercer virtues had playedthe devil with him; every word was thunder, every look lightning;but now all that had passed away. Before he was the FORTITER IN RE;at present he was the SUAVITER IN MODO. His existence was perfectspring, beautifully vernal. All the amiable and softer qualitiesbegan to bud about his heart; a genial warmth was diffused overhim; his soul got green within him; every day was serene, and ifa cloud happened to become visible, there was a roguish rainbowastride of it, on which sat a beautiful Iris that laughed down athim and seemed to say, "Why the dickens, Neal, don't you marry awife?"

Neal could not resist the afflatus which decended on him; anethereal light dwelled, he thought, upon the face of nature; thecolour of the cloth which he cut out from day to day was, to hisenraptured eye, like the colour of Cupid's wings--all purple; hisvisions were worth their weight in gold; his dreams a credit tothe bed he slept on; and his feelings, like blind puppies, youngand alive to the milk of love and kindness which they drew from hisheart. Most of this delight escaped the observation of the world, for Neal, like your true lover, became shy and mysterious. It isdifficult to say what he resembled; no dark lantern ever had morelight shut up within itself than Neal had in his soul, althoughhis friends were not aware of it. They knew, indeed, that he hadturned his back upon valor; but beyond this their knowledge didnot extend. 

Neal was shrewd enough to know that what he felt must be love;nothing else could distend him with happiness until his soul feltlight and bladderlike but love. As an oyster opens when expectingthe tide, so did his soul expand at the contemplation of matrimony. Labour ceased to be a trouble to him; he sang and sewed from morningtill night; his hot goose no longer burned him, for his heart wasas hot as his goose; the vibrations of his head, at each successivestitch, were no longer sad and melancholy. There was a buoyantshake of exultation in them which showed that his soul was placidand happy within him. 

Endless honour be to Neal Malone for the originality with whichhe managed the tender sentiment! He did not, like your commonplacelovers, first discover a pretty girl and afterward become enamouredof her. No such thing; he had the passion prepared beforehand--cutout and made up, as it were, ready for any girl whom it might fit. This was falling in love in the abstract, and let no man condemnit without a trial, for many a long-winded argument could be urgedin its defence. It is always wrong to commence business withoutcapital, and Neal had a good stock to begin with. All we beg isthat the reader will not confound it with Platonism, which nevermarries; but he is at full liberty to call it Socratism, whichtakes unto itself a wife and suffers accordingly. 

Let no one suppose that Neal forgot the schoolmaster's kindness, or failed to be duly grateful for it. Mr. O'Connor was the firstperson whom he consulted touching his passion. With a cheerfulsoul he waited on that melancholy and gentleman-like man, and inthe very luxury of his heart told him that he was in love. 

"In love, Neal!" said the schoolmaster. "May I inquire with whom?"

"Wid nobody in particular yet, " replied Neal; "but o' late I'm gotdivilish fond o' the girls in general. "

"And do you call that being in love, Neal?" said Mr. O'Connor. 

"Why, what else would I call it?" returned the tailor. "Am n't Ifond o' them?"

"Then it must be what is termed the 'universal passion, ' Neal, "observed Mr. O'Connor, "although it is the first time I have seensuch an illustration of it as you present in your own person. "

"I wish you would advise me how to act, " said Neal; "I'm as happy asa prince since I began to get fond o' them an' to think o' marriage. "

The schoolmaster shook his head again, and looked rather miserable. Neal rubbed his hands with glee, and looked perfectly happy. Theschoolmaster shook his head again, and looked more miserable thanbefore. Neal's happiness also increased on the second rubbing. 

Now, to tell the secret at once, Mr. O'Connor would not have appearedso miserable were it not for Neal's happiness; nor Neal so happywere it not for Mr. O'Connor's misery. It was all the result ofcontrast; but this you will not understand unless you be deeplyread in modern novels. 

Mr. O'Connor, however, was a man of sense, who knew, upon thisprinciple, that the longer he continued to shake his head the moremiserable he must become, and the more also would he increase Neal'shappiness; but he had no intention of increasing Neal's happinessat his own expense--for, upon the same hypothesis, it would havebeen for Neal's interest had he remained shaking his head thereand getting miserable until the day of judgment. He consequentlydeclined giving the third shake, for he thought that plainconversation was, after all, more significant and forcible thanthe most eloquent nod, however ably translated. 

"Neal, " said he, "could you, by stretching your imagination, contriveto rest contented with nursing your passion in solitude, and lovethe sex at a distance?"

"How could I nurse and mind my business?" replied the tailor. "I'llnever nurse so long as I'll have the wife; and as for 'magination, it depends upon the grain o'it whether I can stretch it or not. Idon't know that I ever made a coat o'it in my life. "

"You don't understand me, Neal, " said the schoolmaster. "In recommendingmarriage, I was only driving one evil out of you by introducinganother. Do you think that, if you abandoned all thoughts of a wife, you would get heroic again--that is, would you take once more tothe love of fighting?"

"There is no doubt but I would, " said the tailor; "if I miss thewife, I'll kick up such a dust as never was seen in the parish, an'you're the first man that I'll lick. But now that I'm in love, " hecontinued, "sure, I ought to look out for the wife. "

"Ah, Neal, " said the schoolmaster, "you are tempting destiny; yourtemerity be, with all its melancholy consequences, upon your ownhead. "

"Come, " said the tailor; "it wasn't to hear you groaning to thetune o' 'Dhrimmindhoo, ' or 'The old woman rockin' her cradle, ' thatI came; but to know if you could help me in makin' out the wife. That's the discoorse. "

"Look at me, Neal, " said the schoolmaster, solemnly. "I am at thismoment, and have been any time for the last fifteen years, a livingCAVETO against matrimony. I do not think that earth possesses sucha luxury as a single solitary life. Neal, the monks of old werehappy men; they were all fat and had double chins; and, Neal, Itell you that all fat men are in general happy. Care cannot comeat them so readily as at a thin man; before it gets through thestrong outworks of flesh and blood with which they are surrounded, it becomes treacherous to its original purpose, joins the cheerfulspirits it meets in the system, and dances about the heart in allthe madness of mirth; just like a sincere ecclesiastic who comes tolecture a good fellow against drinking, but who forgets his lectureover his cups, and is laid under the table with such success thathe either never comes to finish his lecture, or comes often to belaid under the table. Look at me, Neal, how wasted, fleshless, andmiserable I am. You know how my garments have shrunk in, and whata solid man I was before marriage. Neal, pause, I beseech you;otherwise you stand a strong chance of becoming a nonentity likemyself. "

"I don't care what I become, " said the tailor; "I can't thinkthat you'd be so unreasonable as to expect that any o' the Malonesshould pass out o' the world widout either bein' bate or marrid. Have reason, Mr. O'Connor, an' if you can help me to the wife Ipromise to take in your coat the next time for nothin'. "

"Well, then, " said Mr. O'Connor, "what would you think of thebutcher's daughter, Biddy Neil? You have always had a thirst forblood, and here you may have it gratified in an innocent manner, should you ever become sanguinary again. 'T is true, Neal, she istwice your size and possesses three times your strength; but forthat very reason, Neal, marry her if you can. Large animals areplacid; and Heaven preserve those bachelors whom I wish well froma small wife; 't is such who always wield the sceptre of domesticlife and rule their husbands with a rod of iron. "

"Say no more, Mr. O'Connor, " replied the tailor; "she's the verygirl I'm in love wid, an' never fear but I'll overcome her heartif it can be done by man. Now, step over the way to my house, an'we'll have a sup on the head o' it. Who's that calling?"

"Ah, Neal, I know the tones--there's a shrillness in them not tobe mistaken. Farewell! I must depart; you have heard the proverb, 'Those who are bound must obey. ' Young Jack, I presume, is squalling, and I must either nurse him, rock the cradle, or sing comic tunesfor him, though Heaven knows with what a disastrous heart I oftensing, 'Begone, dull care, ' the 'Rakes of Newcastle, ' or, 'Peas upona Trencher. ' Neal, I say again, pause before you take this leap inthe dark. Pause, Neal, I entreat you. Farewell!"

Neal, however, was gifted with the heart of an Irishman, and scornedcaution as the characteristic of a coward; he had, as it appeared, abandoned all design of fighting, but the courage still adhered tohim even in making love. He consequently conducted the siege ofBiddy Neil's heart with a degree of skill and valor which would nothave come amiss to Marshal Gerald at the siege of Antwerp. Lockeor Dugald Stewart, indeed, had they been cognisant of the tailor'striumph, might have illustrated the principle on which he succeeded;as to ourselves, we can only conjecture it. Our own opinion isthat they were both animated with a congenial spirit. Biddy was thevery pink of pugnacity, and could throw in a body-blow or plant afacer with singular energy and science. Her prowess hitherto had, we confess, been displayed only within the limited range of domesticlife; but should she ever find it necessary to exercise it upon alarger scale, there was no doubt whatsoever, in the opinion of hermother, brothers, and sisters, every one of whom she had successivelysubdued, that she must undoubtedly distinguish herself. There wascertainly one difficulty which the tailor had NOT to encounter inthe progress of fats courtship: the field was his own, he had nota rival to dispute his claim. Neither was there any oppositiongiven by her friends; they were, on the contrary, all anxious forthe match; and when the arrangements were concluded, Neal felthis hand squeezed by them in succession, with an expression moreresembling condolence than joy. Neal, however, had been bred totailoring, and not to metaphysics; he could cut out a coat verywell, but we do not say that he could trace a principle --as whattailor, except Jeremy Taylor, could?

There was nothing particular in the wedding. Mr. O'Connor wasasked by Neal to be present at it; but he shook his head, and toldhim that he had not courage to attend it or inclination to witnessany man's sorrows but his own. He met the wedding-party by accident, and was heard to exclaim with a sigh as they flaunted past him ingay exuberance of spirits: "Ah, poor Neal! he is going like one ofher father's cattle to the shambles! Woe is me for having suggestedmatrimony to the taylor! He will not long be under the necessityof saying that he is 'blue-moulded for want of a beating. ' Thebutcheress will fell him like a Kerry ox, and I may have his bloodto answer for and his discomfiture to feel for in addition to myown miseries. "

On the evening of the wedding-day, about the hour of ten o'clock, Neal, whose spirits were uncommonly exalted, for his heartluxuriated within him, danced with his bridesmaid; after the dancehe sat beside her, and got eloquent in praise of her beauty; andit is said, too, that he whispered to her and chucked her chin withconsiderable gallantry. The tête-à-tête continued for some timewithout exciting particular attention, with one exception; but THATexception was worth a whole chapter of general rules. Mrs. Malonerose up, then sat down again and took off a glass of the native;she got up a second time; all the wife rushed upon her heart. Sheapproached them, and, in a fit of the most exquisite sensibility, knocked the bridesmaid down, and gave the tailor a kick of affectingpathos upon the inexpressibles. The whole scene was a touchingone on both sides. The tailor was sent on all-fours to the floor, but Mrs. Malone took him quietly up, put him under her arm as onewould a lap-dog, and with stately step marched away to the connubialapartment, in which everything remained very quiet for the rest ofthe night. 

The next morning Mr. O'Connor presented himself to congratulatethe tailor on his happiness. Neal, as his friend, shook hands withhim, gave the schoolmaster's fingers a slight squeeze, such as aman gives who would gently entreat your sympathy. The schoolmasterlooked at him, and thought he shook his head. Of this, however, hecould not be certain; for, as he shook his own during the momentof observation, he concluded that it might be a mere mistake of theeye, or, perhaps, the result of a mind predisposed to be credulouson the subject of shaking heads. 

We wish it were in our power to draw a veil, or curtain, or blindof some description, over the remnant of the tailor's narrative thatis to follow; but as it is the duty of every faithful historian togive the secret causes of appearances which the world in generaldoes not understand, so we think it but honest to go on, impartiallyand faithfully, without shrinking from the responsibility that isfrequently annexed to truth. 

For the first three days after matrimony Neal felt like a man whohad been translated to a new and more lively state of existence. He had expected, and flattered himself, that the moment thisevent should take place he would once more resume his heroism, andexperience the pleasure of a drubbing. This determination he kepta profound secret; nor was it known until a future period, when hedisclosed it to Mr. O'Connor. He intended, therefore, that marriageshould be nothing more than a mere parenthesis in his life--a kindof asterisk, pointing, in a note at the bottom, to this singleexception in his general conduct--a nota bene to the spirit of amartial man, intimating that he had been peaceful only for a while. In truth, he was, during the influence of love over him and up tothe very day of his marriage, secretly as blue-moulded as ever forwant of a beating. The heroic penchant lay snugly latent in hisheart, unchecked and unmodified. He flattered himself that he wasachieving a capital imposition upon the world at large, that he wasactually hoaxing mankind in general, and that such an excellentpiece of knavish tranquillity had never been perpetrated beforehis time. 

On the first week after his marriage there chanced to be a fairin the next market-town. Neal, after breakfast, brought forward abunch of shillalahs, in order to select the best; the wife inquiredthe purpose of the selection, and Neal declared that he was resolvedto have a fight that day if it were to be had, he said, for "loveor money. " "The truth is, " he exclaimed, strutting with fortitudeabout the house, "the truth is, that I've DONE the whole of yez--I'mas blue-mowlded as ever for want of a batin'. "

"Don't go, " said the wife. 

"I WILL go, " said Neal, with vehemence; "I 'll go if the wholeparish was to go to prevint me. "

In about another half-hour Neal sat down quietly to his businessinstead of going to the fair!

Much ingenious speculation might be indulged in upon this abrupttermination to the tailor's most formidable resolution; but, forour own part, we will prefer going on with the narrative, leavingthe reader at liberty to solve the mystery as he pleases. In themeantime we say this much; let those who cannot make it out carryit to their tailor; it is a tailor's mystery, and no one has sogood a right to understand it--except, perhaps, a tailor's wife. 

At the period of his matrimony Neal had become as plump and as stoutas he ever was known to be in his plumpest and stoutest days. Heand the schoolmaster had been very intimate about this time; butwe know not how it happened that soon afterward he felt a modest, bride-like reluctance in meeting with that afflicted gentleman. Asthe eve of his union approached, he was in the habit, during theschoolmaster's visits to his workshop, of alluding, in rather asarcastic tone, considering the unthriving appearance of his friend, to the increasing lustiness of his person. Nay, he has often leapedup from his lap-board, and, in the strong spirit of exultation, thrust out his leg in attestation of his assertion, slapping it, moreover, with a loud laugh of triumph that sounded like a knellto the happiness of his emaciated acquaintance. The schoolmaster'sphilosophy, however, unlike his flesh, never departed from him; hisusual observation was, "Neal, we are both receding from the samepoint; you increase in flesh, whilst I, Heaven help me, am fastdiminishing. "

The tailor received these remarks with very boisterous mirth, whilstMr. O'Connor simply shook his head and looked sadly upon his limbs, now shrouded in a superfluity of garments, somewhat resembling aslender thread of water in a shallow summer stream nearly wastedaway and surrounded by an unproportionate extent of channel. 

The fourth month after the marriage arrived, Neal, one day nearits close, began to dress himself in his best apparel. Even then, when buttoning his waistcoat, he shook his head after the mannerof Mr. O'Connor, and made observations upon the great extent towhich it over-folded him. 

"Well, " thought he with a sigh, "this waistcoat certainly DID fitme to a T; but it's wonderful to think how--cloth stretches!"

"Neal, " said the wife, on perceiving him dressed, "where are youbound for?"

"Faith, FOR LIFE" replied Neal, with a mitigated swagger; "and I'das soon, if it had been the will of Provid--"

He paused. 

"Where are you going?" asked the wife a second time. 

"Why, " he answered, "only to dance at Jemmy Connolly's; I 'll beback early. "

"Don't go, " said the wife. 

"I'll go, " said Neal, "if the whole counthry was to prevint me. Thunder an' lightnin', woman, who am I?" he exclaimed, in a loud, but rather infirm voice. "Am n't I Neal Malone, that never met aMAN who'd fight him? Neal Malone, that was never beat by MAN! Why, tare an' ouns, woman! Whoo! I'll get enraged some time, an' playthe divil! Who's afeard, I say?"

"DON'T GO, " added the wife a third time, giving Neal a significantlook in the face. 

In about another half-hour Neal sat down quietly to his businessinstead of going to the dance!

Neal now turned himself, like many a sage in similar circumstances, to philosophy; that is to say, he began to shake his head uponprinciple, after the manner of the schoolmaster. He would, indeed, have preferred the bottle upon principle; but there was no gettingat the bottle except through the wife, and it so happened that bythe time it reached him there was little consolation left in it. Neal bore all in silence; for silence, his friend had often toldhim, was a proof of wisdom. 

Soon after this, Neal one evening met Mr. O'Connor by chance upona plank which crossed a river. This plank was only a foot in breadth, so that no two individuals could pass each other upon it. We cannotfind words in which to express the dismay of both on finding thatthey absolutely glided past each other without collision. 

Both paused and surveyed each other solemnly; but the astonishmentwas all on the side of Mr. O'Connor. 

"Neal, " said the schoolmaster, "by all the household gods, I conjureyou to speak, that I may be assured you live!"

The ghost of a blush crossed the churchyard visage of the tailor. 

"Oh!" he exclaimed, "why the divil did you tempt me to marry awife?"

"Neal, " said his friend, "answer me in the most solemn manner possible;throw into your countenance all the gravity you can assume; speakas if you were under the hands of the hangman, with the rope aboutyour neck, for the question is indeed a trying one which I am aboutto put. Are you still 'blue-moulded for want of a beating'?"

The tailor collected himself to make a reply; he put one legout--the very leg which he used to show in triumph to his friend, but, alas, how dwindled! He opened his waistcoat and lapped itround him until he looked like a weasel on its hind legs. He thenraised himself up on his tiptoes, and, in an awful whisper, replied, "No!!! the divil a bit I'm blue-mowlded for want of a batin'!"

The schoolmaster shook his head in his own miserable manner; but, alas! he soon perceived that the tailor was as great an adept atshaking the head as himself. Nay, he saw that there was a calamitousrefinement, a delicacy of shake in the tailor's vibrations, whichgave to his own nod a very commonplace character. 

The next day the tailor took in his clothes; and from time to timecontinued to adjust them to the dimensions of his shrinking person. The schoolmaster and he, whenever they could steal a moment, metand sympathised together. Mr. O'Connor, however, bore up somewhatbetter than Neal. The latter was subdued in heart and in spirit, thoroughly, completely, and intensely vanquished. His featuresbecame sharpened by misery, for a termagant wife is the whetstoneon which all the calamities of a henpecked husband are painted bythe devil. He no longer strutted as he was wont to do, he no longercarried a cudgel as if he wished to wage a universal battle withmankind. He was now a married man. Sneakingly, and with a cowardlycrawl, did he creep along, as if every step brought him nearerto the gallows. The schoolmaster's march of misery was far slowerthan Neal's, the latter distanced him. Before three years passedhe had shrunk up so much that he could not walk abroad of a windyday without carrying weights in his pockets to keep him firm on theearth which he once trod with the step of a giant. He again soughtthe schoolmaster, with whom, indeed, he associated as much aspossible. Here he felt certain of receiving sympathy; nor was hedisappointed. That worthy but miserable man and Neal often retiredbeyond the hearing of their respective wives, and supported eachother by every argument in their power. Often have they been heardin the dusk of evening singing behind a remote hedge that melancholyditty, "Let us BOTH be unhappy together, " which rose upon thetwilight breeze with a cautious quaver of sorrow truly heartrendingand lugubrious. 

"Neal, " said Mr. O'Connor on one of those occasions, "here is abook which I recommend to your perusal; it is called 'The AfflictedMan's Companion'; try if you cannot glean some consolation out ofit. "

"Faith, " said Neal, "I'm forever oblaged to you, but I don't wantit. I've had 'The Afflicted Man's Companion' too long, and not anatom o' consolation I can get out of it. I have ONE o' them, I tellyou; but, be my sowl, I'll not undertake A PAIR o' them. The veryname's enough for me. " They then separated. 

The tailor's vis vitae must have been powerful or he would havedied. In two years more his friends could not distinguish him fromhis own shadow, a circumstance which was of great inconvenienceto him. Several grasped at the hand of the shadow instead of his;and one man was near paying it five and sixpence for making apair of small-clothes. Neal, it is true, undeceived him with sometrouble, but candidly admitted that he was not able to carry homethe money. It was difficult, indeed, for the poor tailor to bearwhat he felt; it is true he bore it as long as he could; but atlength he became suicidal, and often had thoughts of "making hisown quietus with his bare bodkin. " After many deliberations andafflictions, he ultimately made the attempt; but, alas! he foundthat the blood of the Malones refused to flow upon so ignominiousan occasion. So HE solved the phenomenon; although the truth wasthat his blood was not "i' the vein" for it; none was to be had. What then was to be done? He resolved to get rid of life by someprocess, and the next that occurred to him was hanging. In a solemnspirit he prepared a selvage, and suspended himself from the rafterof his workshop. But here another disappointment awaited him, hewould not hang. Such was his want of gravity that his own weightproved insufficient to occasion his death by mere suspension. Histhird attempt was at drowning; but he was too light to sink; allthe elements, all his own energies, joined themselves, he thought, in a wicked conspiracy to save his life. Having thus tried everyavenue to destruction, and failed in all, he felt like a man doomedto live forever. Henceforward he shrank and shrivelled by slowdegrees, until in the course of time he became so attenuated thatthe grossness of human vision could no longer reach him. 

This, however, could not last always. Though still alive, he wasto all intents and purposes imperceptible. He could only now beheard; he was reduced to a mere essence; the very echo of humanexistence, vox etpraeterea nihil. It is true the schoolmaster assertedthat he occasionally caught passing glimpses of him; but that wasbecause he had been himself nearly spiritualised by affliction, and his visual ray purged in the furnace of domestic tribulation. By-and-by Neal's voice lessened, got fainter and more indistinct, until at length nothing but a doubtful murmur could be heard, whichultimately could scarcely be distinguished from a ringing in theears. 

Such was the awful and mysterious fate of the tailor, who, as a hero, could not, of course, die; he merely dissolved like anicicle, wasted into immateriality, and finally melted away beyondthe perception of mortal sense. Mr. O'Connor is still living, andonce more in the fulness of perfect health and strength. His wife, however, we may as well hint, has been dead more than two years. 

THE BANSHEE

(ANONYMOUS)

Of all the superstitions prevalent amongst the natives of Irelandat any period, past or present, there is none so grand or fanciful, none which has been so universally assented to or so cordiallycherished, as the belief in the existence of the banshee. Thereare very few, however remotely acquainted with Irish life or Irishhistory, but must have heard or read of the Irish banshee; still, as there are different stories and different opinions afloat respectingthis strange being, I think a little explanation concerning herappearance, functions, and habits will not be unacceptable to myreaders. 

The banshee, then, is said to be an immaterial and immortal being, attached, time out of mind, to various respectable and ancientfamilies in Ireland, and is said always to appear to announce, bycries and lamentations, the death of any member of that family towhich she belongs. She always comes at night, a short time previous tothe death of the fated one, and takes her stand outside, convenientto the house, and there utters the most plaintive cries andlamentations, generally in some unknown language, and in a toneof voice resembling a human female. She continues her visits nightafter night, unless vexed or annoyed, until the mourned object dies, and sometimes she is said to continue about the house for severalnights after. Sometimes she is said to appear in the shape of amost beautiful young damsel, and dressed in the most elegant andfantastic garments; but her general appearance is in the likenessof a very old woman, of small stature and bending and decrepit form, enveloped in a winding-sheet or grave-dress, and her long, white, hoary hair waving over her shoulders and descending to her feet. At other times she is dressed in the costume of the middle ages--thedifferent articles of her clothing being of the richest materialand of a sable hue. She is very shy and easily irritated, and, whenonce annoyed or vexed, she flies away, and never returns during thesame generation. When the death of the person whom she mourns iscontingent, or to occur by unforeseen accident, she is particularlyagitated and troubled in her appearance, and unusually loudand mournful in her lamentations. Some would fain have it thatthis strange being is actuated by a feeling quite inimical to theinterests of the family which she haunts, and that she comes with joyand triumph to announce their misfortunes. This opinion, however, is rejected by most people, who imagine her their most devoted friend, and that she was, at some remote period, a member of the family, and once existed on the earth in life and loveliness. It is notevery Irish family can claim the honour of an attendant banshee;they must be respectably descended, and of ancient line, to haveany just pretensions to a warning spirit. However, she does notappear to be influenced by the difference of creed or clime, providedthere be no other impediment, as several Protestant families ofNorman and Anglo-Saxon origin boast of their own banshee; and tothis hour several noble and distinguished families in the countryfeel proud of the surveillance of that mysterious being. Neitheris she influenced by the circumstances of rank or fortune, as sheis oftener found frequenting the cabin of the peasant than thebaronial mansion of the lord of thousands. Even the humble familyto which the writer of this tale belongs has long claimed thehonourable appendage of a banshee; and it may, perhaps, excite anadditional interest in my readers when I inform them that my presentstory is associated with her last visit to that family. 

Some years ago there dwelt in the vicinity of Mountrath, in theQueen's County, a farmer, whose name for obvious reasons we shallnot at present disclose. He never was married, and his only domesticswere a servant-boy and an old woman, a housekeeper, who had longbeen a follower or dependent of the family. He was born and educatedin the Roman Catholic Church, but on arriving at manhood, forreasons best known to himself, he abjured the tenets of that creedand conformed to the doctrines of Protestantism. However, in afteryears he seemed to waver, and refused going to church, and by hismanner of living seemed to favour the dogmas of infidelity or atheism. He was rather dark and reserved in his manner, and oftentimes sullenand gloomy in his temper; and this, joined with his well-knowndisregard of religion, served to render him somewhat unpopularamongst his neighbours and acquaintances. However, he was in generalrespected, and was never insulted or annoyed. He was consideredas an honest, inoffensive man, and as he was well supplied withfirearms and ammunition, --in the use of which he was well practised, having, in his early days, served several years in a yeomanrycorps, --few liked to disturb him, even had they been so disposed. He was well educated, and decidedly hostile to every species ofsuperstition, and was constantly jeering his old housekeeper, whowas extremely superstitious, and pretended to be entirely conversantwith every matter connected with witchcraft and the fairy world. He seldom darkened a neighbour's door, and scarcely ever asked anyone to enter his, but generally spent his leisure hours in reading, of which he was extremely fond, or in furbishing his firearms, towhich he was still more attached, or in listening to and laughingat the wild and blood-curdling stories of old Moya, with which hermemory abounded. Thus he spent his time until the period at whichour tale commences, when he was about fifty years of age, and oldMoya, the housekeeper, had become extremely feeble, stooped, andof very ugly and forbidding exterior. One morning in the month ofNovember, A. D. 1818, this man arose before daylight, and on comingout of the apartment where he slept he was surprised at finding oldMoya in the kitchen, sitting over the raked-up fire, and smokingher tobacco-pipe in a very serious and meditative mood. 

"Arrah, Moya, " said he, "what brings you out of your bed so early?"

"Och musha, I dunna, " replied the old woman; "I was so uneasy allnight that I could not sleep a wink, and I got up to smoke a blast, thinkin' that it might drive away the weight that's on my heart. "

"And what ails you, Moya? Are you sick, or what came over you?"

"No, the Lord be praised! I am not sick, but my heart is sore, andthere's a load on my spirits that would kill a hundred. "

"Maybe you were dreaming, or something that way, " said the man, in a bantering tone, and suspecting, from the old woman's gravemanner, that she was labouring under some mental delusion. 

"Dreaming!" reechoed Moya, with a bitter sneer; "ay, dreaming. Och, I wish to God I was ONLY DREAMING; but I am very much afraidit is worse than that, and that there is trouble and misfortunehanging over uz. "

"And what makes you think so, Moya?" asked he, with a half-suppressedsmile. 

Moya, aware of his well-known hostility to every species ofsuperstition, remained silent, biting her lips and shaking her grayhead prophetically. 

"Why don't you answer me, Moya?" again asked the man. 

"Och, " said Moya, "I am heart-scalded to have it to tell you, and Iknow you will laugh at me; but, say what you will, there is somethingbad over uz, for the banshee was about the house all night, andshe has me almost frightened out of my wits with her shouting andbawling. "

The man was aware of the banshee's having been long supposed tohaunt his family, but often scouted that supposition; yet, as itwas some years since he had last heard of her visiting the place, he was not prepared for the freezing announcement of old Moya. He turned as pale as a corpse, and trembled excessively; at last, recollecting himself, he said, with a forced smile:

"And how do you know it was the banshee, Moya?"

"How do I know?" reiterated Moya, tauntingly. "Didn't I see andhear her several times during the night? and more than that, didn'tI hear the dead-coach rattling round the house, and through theyard, every night at midnight this week back, as if it would tearthe house out of the foundation?"

The man smiled faintly; he was frightened, yet was ashamed to appearso. He again said:

"And did you ever see the banshee before, Moya?"

"Yes, " replied Moya, "often. Didn't I see her when your motherdied? Didn't I see her when your brother was drowned? and sure, there wasn't one of the family that went these sixty years that Idid not both see and hear her. "

"And where did you see her, and what way did she look to-night?"

"I saw her at the little window over my bed; a kind of reddish lightshone round the house; I looked up, and there I saw her old, paleface and glassy eyes looking in, and she rocking herself to andfro, and clapping her little, withered hands, and crying as if hervery heart would break. "

"Well, Moya, it's all imagination; go, now, and prepare my breakfast, as I want to go to Maryborough to-day, and I must be home early. "

Moya trembled; she looked at him imploringly and said: "For Heaven'ssake, John, don't go to-day; stay till some other day, and Godbless you; for if you go to-day I would give my oath there willsomething cross you that's bad. "

"Nonsense, woman!" said he; "make haste and get me my breakfast. "

Moya, with tears in her eyes, set about getting the breakfastready; and whilst she was so employed John was engaged in makingpreparations for his journey. 

Having now completed his other arrangements, he sat down to breakfast, and, having concluded it, he arose to depart. 

Moya ran to the door, crying loudly; she flung herself on her knees, and said: "John, John, be advised. Don't go to-day; take my advice;I know more of the world than you do, and I see plainly that ifyou go you will never enter this door again with your life. "

Ashamed to be influenced by the drivellings of an old cullough, he pushed her away with his hand, and, going out to the stable, mounted his horse and departed. Moya followed him with her eyeswhilst in sight; and when she could no longer see him, she sat downat the fire and wept bitterly. 

It was a bitter cold day, and the farmer, having finished hisbusiness in town, feeling himself chilly, went into a public-houseto have a tumbler of punch and feed his horse; there he met an oldfriend, who would not part with him until he would have anotherglass with him and a little conversation, as it was many years sincethey had met before. One glass brought another, and it was almostduskish ere John thought of returning, and, having nearly ten milesto travel, it would be dark night before he could get home. Stillhis friend would not permit him to go, but called for more liquor, and it was far advanced in the night before they parted. John, however, had a good horse, and, having had him well fed, he did notspare whip or spur, but dashed along at a rapid pace through thegloom and silence of the winter's night, and had already distancedthe town upward of five miles, when, on arriving at a very desolatepart of the road, a gunshot, fired from behind the bushes, put anend to his mortal existence. Two strange men, who had been at thesame public-house in Maryborough drinking, observing that he hadmoney and learning the road that he was to travel, conspired torob and murder him, and waylaid him in this lonely spot for thathorrid purpose. 

Poor Moya did not go to bed that night, but sat at the fire, everymoment impatiently expecting his return. Often did she listen atthe door to try if she could hear the tramp of the horse's footstepsapproaching. But in vain; no sound met her ear except the sadwail of the night wind, moaning fitfully through the tall busheswhich surrounded the ancient dwelling, or the sullen roar of alittle dark river, which wound its way through the lowlands at asmall distance from where she stood. Tired with watching, at lengthshe fell asleep on the hearth-stone; but that sleep was disturbedand broken, and frightful and appalling dreams incessantly hauntedher imagination. 

At length the darksome morning appeared struggling through thewintry clouds, and Moya again opened the door to look out. Butwhat was her dismay when she found the horse standing at the stabledoor without his rider, and the saddle all besmeared with clottedblood. She raised the death-cry; the neighbours thronged round, and it was at once declared that the hapless man was robbed andmurdered. A party on horseback immediately set forward to seekhim, and on arriving at the fatal spot he was found stretched onhis back in the ditch, his head perforated with shot and slugs, and his body literally immersed in a pool of blood. On examininghim it was found that his money was gone, and a valuable goldwatch and appendages abstracted from his pocket. His remains wereconveyed home, and, after having been waked the customary time, were committed to the grave of his ancestors in the little greenchurchyard of the village. 

Having no legitimate children, the nearest heir to his propertywas a brother, a cabinet-maker, who resided in London. A letterwas accordingly despatched to the brother announcing the sadcatastrophe, and calling on him to come and take possession of theproperty; and two men were appointed to guard the place until heshould arrive. 

The two men delegated to act as guardians, or, as they are technicallytermed, "keepers, " were old friends and comrades of the deceased, and had served with him in the same yeomanry corps. Jack O'Malleywas a Roman Catholic--a square, stout-built, and handsome fellow, with a pleasant word for every one, and full of that gaiety, vivacity, and nonchalance for which the Roman Catholic peasantryof Ireland are so particularly distinguished. He was now aboutforty-five years of age, sternly attached to the dogmas of hisreligion, and always remarkable for his revolutionary and anti-Britishprinciples. He was brave as a lion, and never quailed before a man;but, though caring so little for a LIVING man, he was extremelyafraid of a DEAD one, and would go ten miles out of his road atnight to avoid passing a "rath, " or "haunted bush. " Harry Taylor, on the other hand, was a staunch Protestant; a tall, genteel-lookingman, of proud and imperious aspect, and full of reserve and hauteur--thenatural consequence of a consciousness of political and religiousascendency and superiority of intelligence and education, which soconspicuously marked the demeanour of the Protestant peasantry ofthose days. Harry, too, loved his glass as well as Jack, but wasof a more peaceful disposition, and as he was well educated andintelligent, he was utterly opposed to superstition, and laughedto scorn the mere idea of ghosts, goblins, and fairies. Thus Jackand Harry were diametrically opposed to each other in every pointexcept their love of the cruiskeen, yet they never failed to seizeevery opportunity of being together; and, although they often blackenedeach other's eyes in their political and religious disputes, yettheir quarrels were always amicably settled, and they never foundthemselves happy but in each other's society. 

It was now the sixth or seventh night that Jack and Harry, as usual, kept their lonely watch in the kitchen of the murdered man. A largeturf fire blazed brightly on the hearth, and on a bed of strawin the ample chimney-corner was stretched old Moya in a profoundsleep. On the hearthstone, between the two friends, stood a smalloak table, on which was placed a large decanter of whisky, a jugof boiled water, and a bowl of sugar; and, as if to add an idea ofsecurity to that of comfort, on one end of the table were placedin saltier a formidable-looking blunderbuss and a brace of largebrass pistols. Jack and his comrade perpetually renewed theiracquaintance with the whisky-bottle, and laughed and chatted andrecounted the adventures of their young days with as much hilarity asif the house which now witnessed their mirth never echoed to thecry of death or blood. In the course of conversation Jack mentionedthe incident of the strange appearance of the banshee, and expresseda hope that she would not come that night to disturb their carouse. 

"Banshee the devil!" shouted Harry; "how superstitious you papistsare! I would like to see the phiz of any man, dead or alive, who daremake his appearance here to-night. " And, seizing the blunderbuss, and looking wickedly at Jack, he vociferated, "By Hercules, I woulddrive the contents of this through their sowls who dare annoy us. "

"Better for you to shoot your mother than fire at the banshee, anyhow, " remarked Jack. 

"Psha!" said Harry, looking contemptuously at his companion. "Iwould think no more of riddling the old jade's hide than I wouldof throwing off this tumbler;" and, to suit the action to the word, he drained off another bumper of whisky-punch. 

"Jack, " says Harry, "now that we are in such prime humour, willyou give us a song?"

"With all the veins of my heart, " says Jack. "What will it be?"

"Anything you please; your will must be my pleasure, " answeredHarry. 

Jack, after coughing and clearing his pipes, chanted forth, in a boldand musical voice, a rude rigmarole called "The Royal Blackbird, "which, although of no intrinsic merit, yet, as it expressed sentimentshostile to British connection and British government and favourableto the house of Stewart, was very popular amongst the Catholicpeasantry of Ireland, whilst, on the contrary, it was looked uponby the Protestants as highly offensive and disloyal. Harry, however, wished his companion too well to oppose the song, and he quietlyawaited its conclusion. 

"Bravo, Jack, " said Harry, as soon as the song was ended; "thatyou may never lose your wind. "

"In the king's name now I board you for another song, " says Jack. 

Harry, without hesitation, recognised his friend's right to demanda return, and he instantly trolled forth, in a deep, sweet, andsonorous voice, the following:

SONG. 

"Ho, boys, I have a song divine!Come, let us now in concert join, And toast the bonny banks of Boyne--The Boyne of 'Glorious Memory. '

"On Boyne's famed banks our fathers bled;Boyne's surges with their blood ran red;And from the Boyne our foemen fled--Intolerance, chains, and slavery. 

"Dark superstition's blood-stained sonsPressed on, but 'crack' went William's guns, And soon the gloomy monster runs--Fell, hydra-headed bigotry. 

"Then fill your glasses high and fair, Let shouts of triumph rend the air, Whilst Georgy fills the regal chairWe'll never bow to Popery. "

Jack, whose countenance had, from the commencement of the song, indicated his aversion to the sentiments it expressed, now lostall patience at hearing his darling "Popery" impugned, and, seizingone of the pistols which lay on the table and whirling it over hiscomrade's head, swore vehemently that he would "fracture his skullif he did not instantly drop that blackguard Orange lampoon. "

"Aisy, avhic, " said Harry, quietly pushing away the upraised arm;"I did not oppose your bit of treason awhile ago, and besides, the latter end of my song is more calculated to please you than toirritate your feelings. "

Jack seemed pacified, and Harry continued his strain. 

"And fill a bumper to the brim--A flowing one--and drink to himWho, let the world go sink or swim, Would arm for Britain's liberty. 

"No matter what may be his hue, Or black, or white, or green, or blue, Or Papist, Paynim, or Hindoo, We'll drink to him right cordially. "

Jack was so pleased with the friendly turn which the latter partof Harry's song took that he joyfully stretched out his hand, andeven joined in chorus to the concluding stanza. 

The fire had now decayed on the hearth, the whisky-bottle was almostemptied, and the two sentinels, getting drowsy, put out the candleand laid down their heads to slumber. The song and the laugh andthe jest were now hushed, and no sound was to be heard but theincessant "click, click, " of the clock in the inner room and thedeep, heavy breathing of old Moya in the chimney-corner. 

They had slept they knew not how long when the old hag awakenedwith a wild shriek. She jumped out of bed, and crouched betweenthe men; they started up, and asked her what had happened. 

"Oh!" she exclaimed; "the banshee, the banshee! Lord have mercy onus! she is come again, and I never heard her so wild and outrageousbefore. "

Jack O'Malley readily believed old Moya's tale; so did Harry, buthe thought it might be some one who was committing some depredationon the premises. They both listened attentively, but could hearnothing; they opened the kitchen door, but all was still; theylooked abroad; it was a fine, calm night, and myriads of twinklingstars were burning in the deep-blue heavens. They proceeded aroundthe yard and hay-yard; but all was calm and lonely, and no soundsaluted their ears but the shrill barking of some neighbouringcur, or the sluggish murmuring of the little tortuous river inthe distance. Satisfied that "all was right, " they again went in, replenished the expiring fire, and sat down to finish whateverstill remained in the whisky-bottle. 

They had not sat many minutes when a wild, unearthly cry was heardwithout. 

"The banshee again, " said Moya, faintly. Jack O'Malley's soulsank within him; Harry started up and seized the blunderbuss; Jackcaught his arm. "No, no, Harry, you shall not; sit down; there'sno fear--nothing will happen us. "

Harry sat down, but still gripped the blunderbuss, and Jack lithis tobacco-pipe, whilst the old woman was on her knees, strikingher breast, and repeating her prayers with great vehemence. 

The sad cry was again heard, louder and fiercer than before. Itnow seemed to proceed from the window, and again it appeared asif issuing from the door. At times it would seem as if coming fromafar, whilst again it would appear as if coming down the chimneyor springing from the ground beneath their feet. Sometimes the cryresembled the low, plaintive wail of a female in distress, and ina moment it was raised to a prolonged yell, loud and furious, andas if coming from a thousand throats; now the sound resembled a low, melancholy chant, and then was quickly changed to a loud, broken, demoniac laugh. It continued thus, with little intermission, forabout a quarter of an hour, when it died away, and was succeededby a heavy, creaking sound, as if of some large waggon, amidstwhich the loud tramp of horses' footsteps might be distinguished, accompanied with a strong, rushing wind. This strange noiseproceeded round and round the house two or three times, then wentdown the lane which led to the road, and was heard no more. JackO'Malley stood aghast, and Harry Taylor, with all his philosophyand scepticism, was astonished and frightened. 

"A dreadful night this, Moya, " said Jack. 

"Yes, " said she, "that is the dead-coach; I often heard it before, and have sometimes seen it. "

"Seen, did you say?" said Harry; "pray describe it. "

"Why, " replied the old crone, "it's like any other coach, but twiceas big, and hung over with black cloth, and a black coffin on thetop of it, and drawn by headless black horses. "

"Heaven protect us!" ejaculated Jack. 

"It is very strange, " remarked Harry. 

"But, " continued Moya, "it always comes before the death of aperson, and I wonder what brought it now, unless it came with thebanshee. "

"Maybe it's coming for you, " said Harry, with an arch yet subduedsmile. 

"No, no, " she said; "I am none of that family at all at all. "

A solemn silence now ensued for a few minutes, and they thought allwas vanished, when again the dreadful cry struck heavily on theirears. 

"Open the door, Jack, " said Harry, "and put out Hector. "

Hector was a large and very ferocious mastiff belonging to JackO'Malley, and always accompanied him wherever he went. 

Jack opened the door and attempted to put out the dog, but the pooranimal refused to go, and, as his master attempted to force him, howled in a loud and mournful tone. 

"You must go, " said Harry, and he caught him in his arms and flunghim over the half-door. The poor dog was scarcely on the ground whenhe was whirled aloft into the air by some invisible power, and hefell again to earth lifeless, and the pavement was besmeared withhis entrails and blood. 

Harry now lost all patience, and again seizing his blunderbuss, heexclaimed: "Come, Jack, my boy, take your pistols and follow me;I have but one life to lose, and I will venture it to have a crackat this infernal demon. "

"I will follow you to death's doors, " said Jack; "but I would notfire at the banshee for a million of worlds. "

Moya seized Harry by the skirts. "Don't go out, " she cried; "lether alone while she lets you alone, for an hour's luck never shoneon any one that ever molested the banshee. "

"Psha, woman!" said Harry, and he pushed away poor Moya contemptuously. 

The two men now sallied forth; the wild cry still continued, andit seemed to issue from amongst some stacks in the hay-yard behindthe house. They went round and paused; again they heard the cry, and Harry elevated his blunderbuss. 

"Don't fire, " said Jack. 

Harry replied not; he looked scornfully at Jack, then put his fingeron the trigger, and--bang--away it exploded with a thundering sound. An extraordinary scream was now heard, ten times louder and moreterrific than they heard before. Their hair stood erect on theirheads, and huge, round drops of sweat ran down their faces in quicksuccession. A glare of reddish-blue fight shone around the stacks;the rumbling of the dead-coach was again heard coming; it drove upto the house, drawn by six headless sable horses, and the figureof a withered old hag, encircled with blue flame, was seen runningnimbly across the hay-yard. She entered the ominous carriage, and it drove away with a horrible sound. It swept through the tallbushes which surrounded the house; and as it disappeared the oldhag cast a thrilling scowl at the two men, and waved her fleshlessarms at them vengefully. It was soon lost to sight; but theunearthly creaking of the wheels, the tramping of the horses, andthe appalling cries of the banshee continued to assail their earsfor a considerable time after all had vanished. 

The brave fellows now returned to the house; they again made fastthe door, and reloaded their arms. Nothing, however, came to disturbthem that night, nor from that time forward; and the arrival ofthe dead man's brother from London, in a few days after, relievedthem from their irksome task. 

Old Moya did not live long after; she declined from that remarkablenight, and her remains were decently interred in the churchyardadjoining the last earthly tenement of the loved family to whichshe had been so long and so faithfully attached. 

The insulted banshee has never since returned; and although severalmembers of that family have since closed their mortal career, still the warning cry was never given; and it is supposed that theinjured spirit will never visit her ancient haunts until every oneof the existing generation shall have "slept with their fathers. "

Jack O'Malley and his friend Harry lived some years after. Theirfriendship still continued undiminished; like "Tam O'Shanter" and"Souter Johnny, " they still continued to love each other like "avery brither"; and like that jovial pair, also, our two comradeswere often "fou for weeks thegither, " and often over their cruiskeenwould they laugh at their strange adventure with the banshee. Itis now, however, all over with them too; their race isrun, and they are now "tenants of the tomb. "