"Mr. Deady," said the latter, putting on his strongest accent, "I do not think I engaged you to entertain the village with your vocal powers, much as I esteem them. I engaged you to work,—to do honest work for honest wages."

"Begor," said the unabashed Jem, "if I was a Turk, or a Armaynian, I'd be allowed to ate my dinner."

"But this is not your dinner hour!"

"Twelve to wan is the dinner hour, except when I dines at the Grate House, whin, for my convaynience, they puts it off till aight."

It was a sly cut at Father Letheby, and he felt it.

"And your dinner, I presume, is the usual quantity of filthy porter, such as I see represented in your hand."

"It is, your reverence, excep' whin I dines with the Captain. Den we haves roast beef and champagne."

All this Father Letheby told me, with a look of puzzled anger, and with many exclamations.

"I never saw such a people; I'll never understand them," etc. His magnificent impetuosity again.

"Tell me," I said, for he had given me most cordially the privilege of speaking freely, "do you make your meditation regularly?"

"Well, I do," he replied, "in a kind of way."

"Because," I went on to say, "apart from the spiritual advantages it affords, that closing of our eyes daily and looking steadily into ourselves is a wonderfully soothing process. It is solitude—and solitude is the mother country of the strong. It is astonishing what an amount of irritation is poured from external objects through the windows of the soul,—on the retina, where they appear to be focused, and then turned like a burning-glass on the naked nerves of the soul. To shut one's eyes and turn the thoughts inward is like sleep, and, like sleep, gives strength and peace. Now, would you accept from me a subject of meditation?"

"Willingly, sir," he said, like a child.

"All that you want to be perfect is to curb your impetuosity. I notice it everywhere. Probably it is natural; probably it is accentuated by your residence in feverish cities. Now, I have a right to give an advice on this matter, for I got it and took it myself. When I was as young as you I said Mass in twenty minutes, and said the Office in forty minutes. How? Because I slurred over words, spoke to the Almighty as a ballad-singer, and for a few years went through these awful and sacred duties without ever resting or dwelling on their sublime signification. One day a holy old priest said to me:—

"'Father, would you kindly give me an easy translation of the first stanza of the hymn for Terce?'

"I was completely at sea. He saw it.

"'Ah, never mind. But what means factus sum, sicut uter in pruina? You say it every day nearly.'

"I couldn't tell him.

"'Herodii domus dux est eorum.' What is that?"

"I made a feeble attempt here, and translated boldly, 'The house of Herod is their leader.'

"The venerable man looked smilingly at me; and then asked me to look up my Bible. I did, and found that I had been speaking an unknown language to Almighty God for years, and I called it prayer."

Father Letheby looked humbled. He said: "True, Father, I fear; and if you had to say the entire Office, commencing Matins at eleven o'clock at night; or if you had to crush Vespers and Compline, under the light of a street lamp, into the ten minutes before twelve o'clock, you'd see the absurdity of the whole thing more clearly. A strictly conscientious confrere of mine in England used always commence Prime about ten o'clock at night; but then he always lighted a candle, for consistency, before he uttered Jam lucis orto sidere. It is a wonder we were never taught the very translation of the psalms in college."

"Well, we're wandering. But set apart, hic et nunc, a half-hour for Matins and Lauds; twenty minutes for the Small Hours; a quarter of an hour for Vespers and Compline; and take up no other duty until that time has expired. Then never say your Office from memory, even the parts you know best. Read every line from your Breviary. It is not my advice, but that of St. Charles Borromeo. Take half an hour for the celebration of Mass. It will be difficult at first, but it will come all right. Lastly, train yourself to walk slowly and speak slowly and deliberately—"

"You are clipping my wings, Father," said he, "and putting soles of lead on my feet."

"Did you ever hear of Michael Montaigne?" I said.

"Yes. But that's all I know about him."

"Quite enough, indeed. He hardly improves on acquaintance. But his father trained himself to wear leaden shoes in order that he might leap the higher. That's what I want from you. But where's this we were? Oh, yes! You must take these poor people more easily. You cannot undo in a day the operations of three hundred years—"

"Yes, but look how these people spring into the very van of civilization when they go to England or America. Why, they seem to assume at once all the graces of the higher life."

"Precisely,—the eternal question of environment. But under our circumstances we must be infinitely patient."

"What vexes me most," said Father Letheby, "is that we have here the material of saints; and yet—look now at that wretched Deady! I don't mind his insolence, but the shifty dishonesty of the fellow."

"Let him alone! By this time he is stung with remorse for what he said. Then he'll make a general confession to his wife. She'll flay him with her tongue for having dared to say a disrespectful word to God's minister. Then he'll go on a desperate spree for a week to stifle conscience, during which orgies he'll beat his wife black and blue; finally, he'll come to you, sick, humbled, and repentant, to apologize and take the pledge for life again. That's the programme."

"'T is pitiful," said the young priest.

But the following Sunday he recovered all his lost prestige and secured immortal fame at the football match between the "Holy Terrors" of Kilronan and the "Wolfe Tones" of Moydore. For, being asked to "kick off" by these athletes, he sent the ball up in a straight line seventy or eighty feet, and it struck the ground just three feet away from where he stood. There was a shout of acclamation from the whole field, which became a roar of unbounded enthusiasm when he sent the ball flying in a parabola, not six feet from the ground, and right to the hurdles that marked the opposite goal. The Kilronan men were wild about their young curate, and under his eye they beat their opponents hollow; and one admirer, leaning heavily on his caman, was heard to say:—

"My God, if he'd only lade us!"

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 3: "A hundred thousand welcomes, Lord."]

[Footnote 4: A famous Irish architect.]



CHAPTER XIII

"ALL THINGS TO ALL MEN"

In pursuing my course of lectures to my young curate—lectures which he returned with compound interest by his splendid example of zeal and energy—I put into his hands the following lines, addressed by that gentle saint, Francis de Sales, to some one in whom he had a similar interest:—

"Accustom yourself to speak softly and slowly, and to go—I mean walk—quite composedly; to do all that you do gently and quietly, and you will see that in three or four years you will have quite regulated this hasty impetuosity. But carefully remember to act thus gently and speak softly on occasions when the impetuosity is not urging you, and when there is no appearance of danger of it, as, for example, when sitting down, rising up, eating, when you speak to N. N., etc.; and in fact everywhere and in everything dispense not yourself from it. Now, I know that you will make a thousand slips a day over all this, and that your great natural activity will be always breaking out; but I do not trouble myself about this provided that it is not your will, your deliberation; and that, when you perceive these movements, you always try to calm them. Equableness of mind and of outward demeanor is not a particular virtue, but the interior and exterior ornament of a friend of Jesus Christ." (Letter VII.)

Now, here's the difficulty. Undoubtedly he is impetuous, he rushes at conclusions too rapidly, he judges hastily; and with an imperfect knowledge of human nature, which is a mass of irregularities, he worries himself because he cannot bring a whole parish up to his level in a few weeks. That impetuosity shows itself everywhere. He is an anachronism, a being from another time and world, set down in sleepy Kilronan. For the first few weeks that he was here, whenever he slammed his hall door and strode down the village street with long, rapid, undulating steps, all the dogs came out and barked at him for disturbing their slumbers, and all the neighbors came to their doors and asked wildly, "Who's dead? What happened? Where's the fire?" etc., and the consequence was that the wildest rumors used to be circulated; and then, when a few days' experience disproved them, the cumulative wrath of the disappointed villagers fell on Father Letheby's devoted head.

"Why the mischief doesn't he go aisy? Sure, you'd think he was walking for a wager. He'll kill himself in no time if he goes on that way."

He used to laugh airily at all this commotion. And now here was the puzzle. No doubt whatever he can do more work in one day than I or Father Tom Laverty could do in a month. And if I clip his wings, and put lead in his shoes, as he remarked, he may take to slippers and the gout, and all his glorious work be summarily spoiled. That would never do. I have no scruple about what I said regarding the Office and Mass; but if I shall see him creeping past my window in a solemn and dignified manner, I know I shall have qualms of conscience. And yet—

It was in the beginning of December, and one day I had occasion to go down through the village. It was not a day to attract any one out of doors; it was one of those dreadful days which leave an eternal landmark behind them in the trees that are bent inwards toward the mountains from the terrible stress of the southwest winds. Land and sea were wiped out in the cataracts of rain that poured their deluges on sea and moor and mountain; and the channels of the village ran fiercely with brown muddy water; and every living thing was housed, except the ducks, which contemptuously waded through the dirty ruts, and only quacked melodiously when the storm lifted their feathers and flung them from pool to pool of the deserted street. I called on Father Letheby.

"This is dismal weather," I said, "enough to give any one a fit of the blues in this awful place."

He looked at me, as if this were an attempt to draw him. There was a roar of wind that shook his window-sashes, as if it said, "We will get in and spoil your pleasure, whether you like it or not"; and there was a shower of bullets, as from a Maxim, that threatened to smash in and devastate all the cosey comforts.

"By Jove," said he, turning round, "I never felt happier in my life. And every roar and splash of the tempest makes me draw closer and closer to this little nest, which I can call my own home."

It was a cosey nest, indeed. The fire burned merrily,—a little coal, a good deal of bogwood and turf, which is the cleanest fire in the world; there was cleanliness, neatness, tidiness, taste everywhere; the etchings and engravings gave tone to the walls; the piano lay open, as if saying, "Come, touch me"; the books, shining in gold and red and blue and purple, winked in the firelight; and, altogether, it was a picture of delight accentuated by the desolation outside.

"What do I want?" he continued. "Ease? here it is; comfort? here it is; health? thank God, perfect; society? here are the kings of men on my shelves. I have only to summon them,—here Plato, Aristotle, AEschylus, Virgil, Dante, Shakespeare! come here, and they come; speak, and they open their dead lips; be silent, and back they go to their shelves. I have not got your Greek Fathers yet; but they'll come. You notice that my theological library is rather scant. But I can borrow St. Thomas, Lugo, Suarez; I cannot borrow the others, for you are so jealous about your books."

"Rather clever economy!" I said. "But now tell me what you do without the morning paper?"

"Well, now, there you touched a sore point. At least it was; but it is healing. For the first few weeks it was my daily penance. I used always breakfast in England with the paper propped against the teapot. They said it was bad for digestion, but it made me eat slowly; and you may perhaps have perceived,—indeed, you have perceived,—that I am rather quick in my habits."

I nodded oracularly.

"Well, the first few weeks I was here that was my only misery. Without the paper everything looked lonely and miserable. I used to go to the door every five minutes to see whether there was a newsboy on the horizon; but you cannot understand the feeling."

"Can't I? I know it well. You remember what the uprooted tree was to the blinded giant in Virgil:

'Ea sola voluptas, Solamenque mali.'

Well, that was the newspaper to me. But how do you get on now?"

"I never care to see one. Nay, I should rather have a feeling of contempt for any one whom I should see wasting valuable time on them."

"But the news of the world, politics, wars, the amenities of Boards of Guardians, Town Commissioners, etc.; the suicides, the divorces, stocks and shares, etc.;—don't these things interest you?"

"No. My only regret is, when the boys ask me about the war, I am afraid I appear awfully ignorant. And they're so learned. Why, every fellow down at the forge thinks himself a General or an Admiral. 'Ah, if I had dem troops, wouldn't I settle so and so!' Or, 'Why the d—— didn't Gineral S—— bring out his cavalry? 'T is the cavalry does it. Bourbaki—he was the Gineral!' 'Yerra, what was he to Skobeloff?' And they look at me rather mournfully."

Here an awful blast swept the house, as if to raze it to its foundations.

"A pleasant day for a sick-call to Slieveogue!" I said.

"I shouldn't mind one bit. 'T would make the fire the merrier when I returned. I enjoy nothing half so much as walking in the teeth of wind and rain, along the smooth turf on yonder cliffs, the cool air lapping you all round, and the salt of the sea on your lips. Then, when you return, a grand throw-off, and the little home pleasanter by the contrast. By the way, I was out this morning."

"Out this morning? Where?" I exclaimed.

"Up at Campion's."

"Nonsense!"

"Quite true. And would you guess for what, sir?"

"Go on. I am a poor hand at conundrums."

"You don't know Mrs. C——, a constable's widow at Moydore?"

"I can't say I have that pleasure. Stop! Did she come about a license?"

"She did."

"And you helped her?—No! God forbid! That would be too great a somersault!"

"I did."

"What?"

He looked embarrassed, and said, apologetically: "Well, pardon me, sir, and I'll tell you all. She came in here this morning, wet and bedraggled. Her poor widow's weeds were dripping with the rain. She sat there. You see where her boots have left their mark. She said her husband had just died, and left her, of course, penniless, with four young children. There was nothing before her but the workhouse, unless I would help her,—and she heard that I was good to the poor; sure every one was talking about me,—you understand?"

I nodded.

"Well, there was but one possible way in which she could be helped, and that was to get her a license to sell porter and spirits. I stopped her abruptly, and said: 'My dear woman, you might as well ask me to get you appointed lady in waiting to the Queen. But in any case I'd rather cut off my right hand than help any one to get a license. Nay, I am fully determined to cut down every license in this parish until but one is left.' She looked at me in amazement. Then her Celtic temper rose. 'Wisha, 't is aisy for you to lecture poor people who have not a bite or a sup, nor a roof over their heads, wid your carpets, and your pictures, and your pianney, and your brass fire-irons; but if you had four little garlachs to feed, as I have, you'd have a different story.' Here she arose to go; and, as a parting shot: 'God help the poor, however; sure they have no one to go to when their priests desart them.' I don't know what it was," continued Father Letheby, "but I softened a little here, and said: 'Now, I have told you that I cannot do anything towards getting you a license—it's against all my principles; but I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll go up to Captain Campion's with you, and introduce you on the strength of these letters from your parish priest; but remember, not one word shall I say in favor of your demand. Do you understand?' 'I do, your reverence,' she said; 'may God bless you!' The hot fires were ashes again. We both went up in the awful rain. It was rather early even for a morning call, and Captain Campion was not yet down stairs. So I left the widow in the hall, and went out to a sheltered spot, where I could watch the action of the storm on the waves. In half an hour I returned. There was no necessity for an introduction. The good woman had introduced herself, and secured Captain Campion's vote and influence for the next licensing sessions. I was never so sorry—nor so glad."

"'T is a bad business," I said mournfully. "Imagine eight public houses in this wretched village of three hundred souls!"

"'Tis, sir!" he said, as if his conscience stung him; "but I did some good by my visit; I think I have brought Captain Campion around."

"To what?" I exclaimed.

"To recognize his duty to the Church, and the people, and God, by going to his duty."

"You don't say so?" I said, and I was surprised. I could not help thinking of what a glorious triumph it would be to that gentle saint, whose brow was never troubled but with the thought of her father's perversity. How often, how ardently, she had prayed for that day; how many Masses, how many Communions, she had offered to obtain that grace! Many a time I have seen her, after Holy Communion, straining her eyes on the Tabernacle, and I knew she was knocking vigorously at the Heart of Christ; and many a time have I seen her, a Lady of Sorrows, imploring the Queen of Sorrows to take that one trouble from her life. Oh! if men could only know what clouds of anguish and despair their indifference to the practices of their holy religion brings down upon gentle hearts, that dare not speak their sorrow, the Church would not have to mourn so many and such faithless and rebellious children.

I said to Father Letheby: "God bless you; but how did you work the miracle?"

"Well," he said bashfully, "it was not the work of one day or of one visit. I have been laying my train to the citadel; to-day I fired it, and he capitulated. Tell me, sir, did you ever hear of the Halcyone?"

Did I ever hear of the Halcyone? Who didn't? Was there a man, woman, or child, from the Cliffs of Moher to Achill Island, that did not know the dainty five-ton yacht, which, as a contrast to his own turbulent spirit, he had so named? Was it not everywhere said that Campion loved that yacht more than his child,—that he spoke to her and caressed her as a living thing,—and how they slept on the calm deep on summer nights, whilst phosphor-laden waves lapped around them, and only the dim dawn, with her cold, red finger woke them to life? And was it not told with pride and terror in every coracle along the coast with what fierce exultation he took her out on stormy days, and headed her straight against the billows, that broke into courtesies on every side, and how she leaped up the walls of water which lay down meekly beneath her, and shook out her white sail to the blast, until its curved face brushed the breakers, and her leaden keel showed through the valleys of the sea? and men leaned on their spades to see her engulfed in the deep, and the coast-guards levelled their long glasses, and cried: "There goes mad Campion and the witch again!"

"What do you know about the Halcyone?" said I.

"A good deal by hearsay; not a little by personal experience," he replied.

"Why, you don't mean to say that you have seen the famous yacht?" I asked, in amazement.

"Seen her, steered her, laughed at her, feared her, like Campion himself."

"Why, I thought Campion never allowed any one but himself and his daughter to cross her gunwale?"

"Well, all that I tell you is, I have been out several evenings with the Captain; and if you want to examine me in jibs, and mainsails, and top-gallants, now is your time."

Look here! This curate of mine is becoming quite humorous, and picking up all our Celtic ways. I don't at all like it, because I would much rather he would keep up all his graceful dignity. But there again—the eternal environments. How far will he go?

"Don't mind your lessons in navigation now," I said, "but come to the point. How—did—you—catch—Campion?"

"Well, 't is a long story, but I shall try to abridge it. I knew there was but one way to this man's heart, and I was determined to try it. Has not some one said, 'All things to all men?' Very well. Talk to a farmer about his crops, to a huntsman about his horses, to a fisherman about his nets, you have him in the palm of your hands. It is a kind of Christian diplomacy; but I would much rather it were not necessary."

He was silent, leaning his head on his hands.

"Never mind," I said, "the question of honor. Human nature is a very crooked thing, and you can't run a level road over a hill."

"I never like even the shadow of deception," he said; "I hate concealment; and yet I should not like Campion to know that I practised even so innocent a stratagem."

"Oh, shade of Pascal!" I cried, "even you could detect no casuistry here. And have you no scruple, young man, in keeping an old gentleman on the tenter-hooks of expectation whilst you are splitting hairs? Go on, like a good fellow, I was never so interested in my life. The idea of landing Campion!"

"Well, 't was this way. I knew a little about boats, and made the Captain cognizant of the fact. I expected an invitation. He did not rise to the bait. Then I tried another plan. I asked him why he never entered the Halcyone for the Galway regatta. He muttered something of contempt for all the coast boats. I said quietly that I heard she tacked badly in a strong gale, and that it was only in a light breeze she did well. He got furious, which was just what I wanted. We argued and reasoned; and the debate ended in his asking me out the first fresh day that came last September. I don't know if you remember that equinoctial gale that blew about the 18th or 19th. It was strong, much stronger than I cared for; but I was pinned to my engagement. I met him down at the creek. The wind blew off the land. It was calm enough in the sheltered water; but when we got out, by Jove, I wished a hundred times that I was here. I lay down in the gangway of the yacht whilst Campion steered. From time to time great waves broke over the bow of the yacht, and in a little while I was drenched to the skin. Campion had his yellow oil-skins, and laughed at me. Occasionally he asked, Does she tack well? I answered coolly. I knew he was trying my nerve, as we mounted breaker after breaker and plunged down into awful valleys of the sea. Then, as one great squall broke round and the yacht keeled over, he turned the helm, until she lay flat on a high wave, and her great sail swept the crest of its foam, and her pennon dipped in the deep. I thought it was all over, as I clutched the gunwale to prevent my falling into the sea. He watched me narrowly, and in a moment righted the yacht.

"'We were near Davy Jones's locker there?' he said coolly.

"'We wouldn't remain long together,' I replied.

"'How?'

"'Well, you know, you'd go a little deeper, and I should hope I would get a little higher.'

"'You mean I'd have gone to Hell?'

"'Certainly,' I replied.

"'I'm not a bad man,' he said, taken aback.

"'You are,' I replied; 'you persecute the poor and drag their faces through the dust. You're an irreligious man, because you never kneel to God; you're a dishonest man, because you profess to belong to a faith whose doctrines you do not accept, and whose commands you disobey.'

"'Hallo, there!' said he, 'I'm not used to this kind of language.'

"'Perhaps not,' I said; for with the thorough drenching and the fright I was now thoroughly angry. 'But you'll have to listen to it. You cannot put your fingers in your ears and steer the Halcyone. It will take us an hour to reach land, and you must hear what you never heard before.'

"'I've a strong inclination,' he said, 'to pitch you overboard.'

"'I'm quite sure you're perfectly capable of murder,' I said. 'But again, you cannot let go the ropes in this gale. Besides, there are two sides to that question.'

"Then and there I pitched into him, told him how he was breaking his child's heart, how he was hated all along the coast, etc., etc.; but I insisted especially on his dishonesty in professing a creed which he denied in daily practice. I was thoroughly angry, and gave my passion full swing. He listened without a word as we went shoreward. At last he said:

"'By Jove! I never thought that a priest could speak to a gentleman so boldly. Now, that damned old landlubber'—I beg your pardon, sir," broke in my curate, "the words escaped me involuntarily."

"Never mind," I said, "go on."

"But it was very disrespectful—"

"Now, I insist on hearing every word he said. Why, that's the cream of the story."

"Well, he said: 'That damned old landlubber and bookworm never addressed me in that manner,'—but perhaps he meant some one else."

"Never fear! He meant his respected old pastor. The 'landlubber' might apply to other natives; but I fear they could hardly be called 'bookworm' with any degree of consistency. But go on."

"Well, you know, he spoke rather jerkily, and as if in soliloquy. 'Well, I never!' 'Who'd have thought it from this sleek fellow?' 'Why, I thought butter would not melt in his mouth!' 'What will Bittra say when I tell her?' At last we pulled into the creek; I jumped ashore from the dingey, as well as my dripping clothes would let me, and lifting my hat, without a word, I walked towards home. He called after me:—

"'One word, Father Letheby! You must come up to the house and dry yourself. You'll catch your death of cold.'

"'Oh! 't will be nothing,' I said. He had come up with me, and looked humbled and crestfallen.

"'You must pardon all my rudeness,' he said, in a shamefaced manner. 'But, to be very candid with you, I was never met so boldly before, and I like it. We men of the world hate nothing so much as a coward. If some of your brethren had the courage of their convictions and challenged us poor devils boldly, things might be different. We like men to show that they believe in Hell by trying to keep us from it.' But now I am sounding my own praises. It is enough to say that he promised to think the matter over; and I clinched the whole business by getting his promise that he would be at the altar on Christmas morning."

I thought a good deal, and said: "It is a wholesome lesson. We have no scruple in cuffing Jem Deady or Bill Shanahan; but we don't like to tackle the big-wigs. And they despise us for our cowardice. Isn't that it? Well, my dear fellow, you are a [Greek: tetragonos aner], as old Aristotle would say,—an idea, by the way, stolen by Dante in his 'sta come torre ferma.' In plainer language, you're a brick! Poor little Bittra! how pleased she'll be!"



CHAPTER XIV

FIRST FRIDAYS

I notice, as I proceed with these mnemonic scraps from my diary, and try to cast them into shape, a curious change come over me. I feel as one waking from a trance, and all the numbed faculties revive and assert their power; and all the thoughts and desires, yea, even the capabilities of thirty years ago, come back and seem to claim their rightful places, as a deposed king would like to sit on his throne, and hold his sceptre once more before he dies. And so all my ideas are awakening; and the cells of memory, as if at some magic Sesame, yield up their contents; and even the mechanical trick of writing, which they say is never fully lost, appears to creep back into my rheumatized fingers as the ink flows freely from my pen. I know, indeed, that some say I am passing into my second childhood. I do not resent it; nor would I murmur even at such a blessed dispensation. For I thank God I have kept through all the vicissitudes of life, and all the turbulence of thought, the heart of a little child.

There is nothing human that does not interest me. All the waywardness of humanity provokes a smile; there is no wickedness so great that I cannot pity; no folly that I cannot condone; patient to wait for the unravelling of the skein of life till the great Creator willeth, meanwhile looking at all things sub specie aeternitatis, and ever finding new food for humility in the barrenness of my own life. But it has been a singular intellectual revival for me to feel all my old principles and thoughts shadowing themselves clearer and clearer on the negatives of memory where the sunflames of youth imprinted them, and from which, perhaps, they will be transferred to the tablets that last for eternity. But here God has been very good unto me in sending me this young priest to revive the past. We like to keep our consciousness till we die. I am glad to have been aroused by so sympathetic a spirit from the coma of thirty years.

It is quite true, indeed, that he disturbs, now and again, the comforts of senile lethargy. And sometimes the old Adam will cry out, and sigh for the leaden ages, for he is pursuing with invincible determination his great work of revival in the parish. He has doubled, trebled, the confessions of the people on Saturday, and the subsequent Sunday Communions. He has seized the hearts of all the young men. He is forever preaching to them on the manliness of Christ,—His truthfulness, His honor, His fearlessness, His tenderness. He insists that Christ had a particular affection for the young. Witness how He chose His Apostles, and how He attached them to His Sacred Person. And thus my curate's confessional is thronged every Saturday night by silent, humble, thoughtful young fellows, sitting there in the dark, for the two candles at the altar rails throw but a feeble light into the blackness; and Mrs. Darcy, under all improvements, has retained her sense of economy.

"Where's the use," she says, "of lighting more than wan candle, for wan candle is as good as fifty?"

She has compromised with Father Letheby for two, for his slightest wish is now a command.

And so the young girls and all the men go to Father Letheby's confessional. The old women and the little children come to me. They don't mind an occasional growl, which will escape me sometimes. Indeed, they say they'd rather hear one roar from the "ould man" than if Father Letheby, "wid his gran' accent," was preaching forever. But young men are sensitive; and I am not sorry.

Yet, if my Guardian Angel were to ask me, What in the world have you to grumble about? I couldn't tell him. For I never come away from that awful and sacred duty of the confessional without a sense of the deepest humiliation. I never sit in "the box," as the people call the confessional. A slight deafness in one ear, and the necessity of stretching occasionally a rheumatized foot, make it more convenient for me to sit over there, near and under the statue of our Blessed Mother. There in my arm-chair I sit, with the old cloak wrapped round me that sheltered me many a night on the mountains. And there the little children come, not a bit shy or afraid of old "Daddy Dan." They pick their way across the new carpet with a certain feeling of awkwardness, as if there were pins and needles hidden somewhere; but when they arrive at safe anchorage, they put their dirty clasped fingers on my old cassock, toss the hair from their eyes, and look me straight in the face, whilst they tell their little story to me and God. They are now well trained in the exact form of confession. Father Letheby has drilled them well. But dear me! what white souls they are! Poverty and purity have worked hand in hand to make them angelic, and their faces are transfigured by the light that shines within. And their attenuated bodies show clearly the burning lamp of holiness and faith, as a light shines soft and clear through the opal shades of porcelain or Sevres. And the little maidens always say, "Tank you, Fader," when they receive their penance; and the boys say, "All right." I sometimes expect to hear "old fellow" added. Then the old women come; and, afraid to touch the grand carpet with their feet, they leave rather vivid impressions in brown mud on the waxed floor, which is the very thing that Miss Campion does not want; and they throw themselves backward whilst they recite in the soft, liquid Gaelic the Confiteor; and then raise themselves erect, pull up their black cloaks or brown shawls with the airs and dignity of a young barrister about to address the jury, arrange the coif of shawl or hood of cloak around their heads, and then tell you—nothing! God bless them, innocent souls! No need for these elaborate preparations. Yet what contrition, what sorrow, what love they pour forth over some simple imperfections, where even a Jansenist cannot detect the shadow of a venial sin! No wonder that my curate declares that we have material in Ireland to make it again a wonder to the world,—an Island of Saints once more! But something is wanting. He does not know what, nor do I. But he says sometimes that he feels as if he were working in the dark. He cannot get inside the natures of the people. There is a puzzle, an enigma somewhere. The people are but half revealed to us. There is a world of thought and feeling hidden away somewhere, and unrevealed. Who has the key? He is seeking for it everywhere, and cannot find it. Now, you know, he is a transcendentalist, so I don't mind these vagaries; yet he is desperately in earnest.

But he is very kind and tender towards his old pastor. When he "started" the devotion of the Nine Fridays in honor of the Sacred Heart, of course he set them all wild. Their eternal salvation depended on their performing the Nine Fridays successively. And so one Thursday night, when the wind was howling dismally, and the rain pattering on the windows, and the fire in my little grate looking all the brighter from the contrast, a timid knock came to my door. I put down the Pensees of Pascal,—a book for which I have a strange predilection, though I do not like the man who wrote it.

"Some children want to see you, sir," said Hannah. "I hope you're not going to leave the house in this weather."

"Send them in and let us see," I replied.

They came to the door reluctantly enough, one pushing the other before her, and there they stood bashfully, their fingers in their mouths, staring at the lamp, and the pictures, and the books, like Alice in Wonderland.

"Well, what's up, now?" I said, turning around.

"'T is the way we wants to go to confession, Fader."

"Hallo! are ye going to die to-night that ye are in such a mighty hurry?"

"No, Fader, but to-morrow is the fust Friday."

"Indeed! so it is. What has that to do with the matter?"

"But we are all making the Nine Fridays, Fader; and if we break wan, we must commence all over again."

"Well, run down to Father Letheby; he'll hear you."

"Father Letheby is in his box, Fader; and"—here there was a little smile and a fingering of the pinafores—"we'd rader go to you, Fader."



I took the compliment for what it was worth. The Irish race appear to have kissed the Blarney stone in globo.

"And have you no pity on a poor old man, to take him out this dreadful night down to that cold church, and keep him there till ten or eleven o'clock to-night?"

"We won't keep you long, Fader. We were at our juty last month."

"All right, get away, and I'll follow you quickly. Mind your preparation."

"All right, Fader."

"'T isn't taking leave of your seven sinses you are, going down to that cowld chapel this awful night," said Hannah, when she had closed the door on the children. "Wisha, thin, if I knew what them whipsters wanted, 't is long before they crossed the thrishol of the door. Nine Fridays, begor! As if the Brown Scaffler and the first Sunday of the month wasn't enough for them. And here I'll be now for the rest of the winter, cooking your coughs and cowlds. Sure, you're no more able to take care of yerself than an unwaned child."

She brought me my boots, and my old cloak, and my muffler, and my umbrella all the same; and as I passed into the darkness and the rain, I heard anathemas on "these new fandangos, as if there weren't as good priests in the parish as ever he was."

I slipped into the church, as I thought, unperceived; but I was hardly seated, when I heard the door of Father Letheby's confessional flung open; and with his quick, rapid stride, and his purple stole flying from his shoulders, he was immediately at my side, and remonstrating vigorously at my imprudence.

"This is sheer madness, sir, coming out of your warm room on this dreadful night. Surely, when I got your permission to establish this devotion, I never intended this."

"Never mind, now," I said, "I'm not going to allow you to make a somersault into heaven over my head. In any case, these little mites won't take long."

They looked alarmed enough at his angry face.

"Well, then, I shall ask you to allow me to discontinue this devotion after to-night."

"Go back to your confessional. Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof. There's plenty of time to consider the future."

He was much annoyed over my indiscretion; but he resumed his work. Mine was quickly gone through, and I passed up the dimly lighted aisle, wondering at myself. Just near the door, I could not forbear looking around the deep sepulchral gloom. It was lit by the one red lamp that shone like a star in the sanctuary, and by the two dim waxlights in tin sconces, that cast a pallid light on the painted pillars, and a brown shadow farther up, against which were silhouetted the figures of the men, who sat in even rows around Father Letheby's confessional. Now and again a solitary penitent darkened the light of the candles, as he moved up to the altar rails to read his penance or thanksgiving; or the quick figure of a child darted rapidly past me into the thicker darkness without. Hardly a sound broke the stillness, only now and then there was a moan of sorrow, or some expression of emphasis from the penitents; and the drawing of the slides from time to time made a soft sibilance, as of shuttles, beneath which were woven tapestries of human souls that were fit to hang in the halls of heaven. Silently the mighty work went forward; and I thought, as there and then the stupendous sacrifice of Calvary was brought down into our midst, and the hands of that young priest gathered up the Blood of Christ from grass, and stone, and wood,—from reeking nails and soldier's lance, and the wet weeping hair of Magdalen, and poured it softly on the souls of these young villagers,—I thought what madness possesses the world not to see that this sublime assumption of God's greatest privilege of mercy is in itself the highest dogmatic proof of the Divine origin of the Church; for no purely human institution could dare usurp such an exalted position, nor assume the possession of such tremendous power.

As I knelt down, and turned to leave the church, I felt my cloak gently pulled. I looked down and faintly discerned in the feeble light some one huddled at my feet. I thought at first it was one of the little children, for they used sometimes to wait for the coveted privilege of holding the hand of their old pastor, and conducting him homeward in the darkness. This was no child, however, but some one fully grown, as I conjectured, though I saw nothing but the outline of wet and draggled garments. I waited. Not a word came forth, but something like the echo of a sob. Then I said:—

"Whom have I here, and what do you want?"

"Father, Father, have pity!"

"I do not know who you are," I replied, "and wherefore I should have pity. If you stand up and speak, I'll know what to say or do."

"You know me well," said the woman's voice, "too well. Am I to be cast out forever?"

Then I recognized Nance, who had followed and blessed Father Tom the evening he left us. She did not bless me nor address me. I had to speak publicly of poor Nance; perhaps, indeed, I spoke too sharply and strongly,—it is so hard to draw the line between zeal and discretion, it is so easy to degenerate into weakness or into excess. And Nance feared me. Probably she was the only one of the villagers who never dared address me.

"What do you want here?" I gently said.

"What do I want here? 'T is a quare question for a priest to be afther asking. What did the poor crature want when she wint to a bigger man dan you, and she wasn't turned away aither?"

"Yes, Nance; but she repented and loved Christ, and was prepared to die rather than sin again."

"And how do you know but I'm the same? Do you know more than the God above you?—and He is my witness here to-night before His Blessed and Holy Son that all hell-fire won't make me fall again. Hell-fire, did I say?" Her voice here sunk into a low whisper. "It isn't hell-fire I dread, but His face and yours."

I stooped down and lifted her gently. The simple kindness touched the broken vase of her heart, and she burst into an agony of passionate tears.

"Oh, wirra! wirra! if you had only said that much to me three months ago, what you'd have saved me. But you'd the hard word, Father, and it drove me wild to think that, as you said, I wasn't fit to come and mix with the people at Mass. And many and many a night in the cowld and hunger, I slept there at the door of the chapel; and only woke up to bate the chapel door, and ask God to let me in. But sure His hand was agin me, like yours, and I daren't go in. And sometimes I looked through the kayhole, to where His heart was burnin', and I thought He would come out, when no one could see Him, and spake to me; but no! no! Him and you were agin me; and then the chapel woman 'ud come in the cowld of the mornin', and I would shlink away to my hole agin?"

"Speak low, Nance," I whispered, as her voice hissed through the darkness. "The men will hear you!"

"They often heard worse from me than what I am saying to-night, God help me! 'T isn't the men I care about, nor their doings. But whin the young girls would crass the street, les' they should come near me, and the dacent mothers 'ud throw their aprons over their childres' heads, les' they should see me, ah! that was the bitter pill. And many and many a night, whin you wor in your bed, I stood down on dem rocks below, with the say calling for me, and the hungry waves around me and there was nothin' betune me and hell but that—"

She fumbled in her bosom and drew out a ragged, well-worn scapular with a tiny medal attached, and kissed it.

"And sure I know if I wint with 'em, I should have to curse the face of the Blessed and Holy Mary forever, and I said then, 'Never! Never!' and I faced the hard world agin."

I detected the faintest odor of spirits as she spoke.

"'T is hardly a good beginning, Nance, to come here straight from the public house."

"'Twas only a thimbleful Mrs. Haley gave me, to give me courage to face you."

"And what is it to be now? Are you going to change your life?"

"Yerra, what else would bring me here to-night?"

"And you are going to make up your mind to go to confession as soon as you can?"

"As soon as I can? This very moment, wid God's blessing."

"Well, then, I'll ask Father Letheby to step out for a moment and hear you."

"If you do, then I'll lave the chapel on the spot, and maybe you won't see me agin." She pulled up her shawl, as if to depart.

"What harm has Father Letheby done you? Sure every one likes him."

"Maybe! But he never gave me word or look that wasn't pison since he came to the parish. I'll go to yourself."

"But," I said, fearing that she had still some dread of me that might interfere with the integrity of her confession, "you know I have a bad tongue—"

"Never mind," she said, "if you have. Sure they say your bark is worse than your bite."

And so, then and there, in the gloom of that winter's night, I heard her tale of anguish and sorrow; and whilst I thanked God for this, His sheep that was lost, I went deeper down than ever into the valleys of humiliation and self-reproach: "Caritas erga homines, sicut caritas Dei erga nos."[5] Here was my favorite text, here my sum total of speculative philosophy. I often preached it to others, even to Father Letheby, when he came complaining of the waywardness of this imaginative and fickle people. "If God, from on high, tolerates the unspeakable wickedness of the world,—if He calmly looks down upon the frightful holocaust of iniquity that steams up before His eyes from the cities and towns and hamlets of the world,—if He tolerates the abomination of paganism, and the still worse, because conscious, wickedness of the Christian world, why should we be fretful and impatient? And if Christ was so gentle and so tender towards these foul, ill-smelling, leprous, and ungrateful Jews, why should we not be tolerant of the venial falls of the holy people,—the kingly nation?" And I was obliged to confess that it was all pride,—too much sensitiveness, not to God's dishonor, but to the stigma and reproach to our own ministrations, that made us forget our patience and our duty. And often, on Sunday mornings in winter, when the rain poured down in cataracts, and the village street ran in muddy torrents, and the eaves dripped in steady sheets of water, when I stood at my own chapel door and saw poor farmers and laborers, old women and young girls, drenched through and through, having walked six miles down from the farthest mountains; and when I saw, as I read the Acts and the Prayer before Mass, a thick fog of steam rising from their poor clothes and filling the entire church with a strange incense, I thought how easy it ought to be for us to condone the thoughtlessness or the inconsiderate weaknesses of such a people, and to bless God that our lot was cast amongst them. I heard, with deeper contrition than hers, the sins of that poor outcast; for every reproach she addressed to me I heard echoed from the recesses of that silent tabernacle. But all my trouble was increased when I insisted on her approaching the Holy Table in the morning. The thought of going to Holy Communion appalled her. "Perhaps in eight or twelve months she'd be fit; but to-morrow—"

Her dread was something intense, almost frightful:—

"Sure He'll kill me, as He killed the man who towld the lie!"

I tried to reassure her:—

"But they say he'll bleed if I touch Him."

I gently reasoned and argued with her. Then her objections took a more natural turn:—

"Sure the people will all rise up and lave the chapel."

Then it became a question of dress. And it was with the greatest difficulty, and only by appealing to her humility, and as a penance, that I at last induced her to consent to come up to the altar rails after all the people had received Holy Communion. There was a slight stir next morning when all the people had reverently retired from the Holy Table. I waited, holding the Sacred Host over the Ciborium. The people wondered. Then, from the farthest recess of the church, a draped figure stole slowly up the aisle. All knew it was Nance. So far from contempt, only pity, deep pity, filled the hearts of old and young; and one could hear clearly the tchk! tchk! that curious click of sympathy which I believe is peculiar to our people. The tears streamed down the face of the poor penitent as I placed the Sacred Host upon her tongue. Then she rose strengthened, and walked meekly, but firmly, back to her place. As she did, I noticed that she wore a thick black shawl. It was the quick eye of my curate that had seen all. It was his gentle, kind heart that forestalled me.

I got an awful scolding from Hannah when I came home that night in the rain.

"Never mind, Hannah," I said, when she had exhausted her diatribe, "I never did a better night's work in my life."

She looked at me keenly; but these poor women have some queer way of understanding things; and she said humbly:—

"Than' God!"

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 5: Charity towards men, as the charity of God towards us.]



CHAPTER XV

HOLLY AND IVY

The progress of my curate and myself in our study of the Greek authors is not so steady or so successful as we had anticipated. Somehow or other we drift away from the subject-matter of our evening lessons, and I am beginning to perceive that his tastes are more modern, or, to speak more correctly, they tend to less archaic and more interesting studies. Then again I have read somewhere that the Hebrew characters, with their minute vowel-points, have driven blind many an enthusiastic scholar, and I fear these black Greek letters are becoming too much for my old sight. There now, dear reader, don't rush to the conclusion that this is just what you anticipated; you knew, of course, how it would be. You never had much faith in these transcendental enterprises of reviving Greek at the age of seventy-five, and you shook your incredulous head at the thought of an Academia of two honorary members at Kilronan. Now we have done a little. If you could only see the "Dream of Atossa" done into English pentameters by my curate, and my own "Prometheus"—well, there, this won't do—Vanity of vanities, said the Preacher.

But this much I shall be pardoned. I cannot help feeling very solemn and almost sad at the approach of Christmas time. Whether it is the long, gloomy tunnel that runs through the year from November to April,—these dark, sad days are ever weeping,—or whether it is the tender associations that are linked with the hallowed time and the remembrance of the departed I know not; but some indescribable melancholy seems to hover around and hang down on my spirits at this holy season; and it is emphasized by a foreboding that somewhere in the future this great Christian festival will degenerate into a mere bank holiday, and lose its sacred and tender and thrice-sanctified associations. By the way, is it not curious that our governments are steadily increasing the number of secular holidays, whilst the hands of Pharisees are still uplifted in horror at the idleness and demoralization produced amongst Catholics by the eight or ten days that are given in the year to the honor of God's elect?

Well, we shall stand by the old traditions to the end. And one of my oldest habits has been to read up at Christmas time every scrap of literature that had any bearing whatever on the most touching and the most important event in all human history. And so, on the Sunday evening preceding the celebration of Father Letheby's first Christmas in Kilronan, I spoke to him at length on my ideas and principles in connection with this great day; and we went back, in that rambling, desultory way that conversation drifts into,—back to ancient prophecies and forecastings, down to modern times,—tales of travellers about Bethlehem, the sacrilegious possession of holy places by Moslems, etc., etc., until the eyes of my curate began to kindle, and I saw a possible Bernard or Peter in his fine, clear-cut face, and a "Deus vult" in the trembling of his lips. Ah me! what a glorious thing is this enthusiasm of the young,—this noble idealism, that spurns the thought of consequences, only sees the finger of God beckoning and cares not whither!

"Hand me down that Virgil," I said, to avert an explosion, for when he does break out on modern degeneracy he is not pleasant to hear.

"Now spare my old eyes, and read for me, with deliberation, those lines of the Fourth Eclogue which forecast the coming of our Lord!"

He read in his fine sonorous voice, and he did full justice to the noble lines:—

"Ultima Cumaei venit jam carminis aetas; Magnus ab integro saeclorum nascitur ordo. Jam redit et Virgo, redeunt Saturnia regna; Jam nova progenies caelo demittitur alto,"—

down to the two lines which I repeated as a prayer:—

"O mihi tam longae maneat pars ultima vitae Spiritus et, quantum sat erit tua dicere facta."

"No wonder," he said, at length, "that the world of the Middle Ages, which, by the way, were the ages of enlightenment, should have regarded Virgil as a magician and even as a saint."

"But," he said, after a pause, "the 'Dream of the Dead Christ' would be almost more appropriate nowadays. It is terrible to think how men are drifting away from Him. There's Ormsby now, a calm, professed infidel; and absolutely nothing in the way to prevent his marriage with Miss Campion but his faith, or want of faith."

"Ormsby!" I cried. "Infidel! Marriage with Miss Campion!—want of faith!!! What in the world is this sudden discharge of fireworks and Catherine-wheels upon your pastor? Or where has all this gunpowder been hitherto stored?"

"I thought I had told you, sir," he said, timidly, "but I have so many irons in the fire. You know that Ormsby's marriage is only a question of weeks but for one thing."

"And, if I am not trespassing too much on the secrecy of your confidential intercourse with these young people," I said (I suppose I was a little huffed), "may I ask how long is all this matrimonial enterprise in progress, and how does Campion regard it?"

"I am afraid you are offended, sir," he said, "and indeed quite naturally, because I have not spoken about this matter to you before; but really it appears so hopeless, and I hate speaking of things that are only conjectural. I suppose you had set your heart on Miss Campion's becoming a nun?"

"God forbid!" I said fervently. "We don't want to see all our best girls running into convents. I had set my heart on her being married to some good, excellent Catholic Irishman, like the Chief over at Kilkeel."

"Neil Cullen? Campion wouldn't listen to it. His name is a red rag to a bull. He never forgave Cullen for not firing on the people at that eviction over at Labbawally, some two or three years ago."

"And what does the person most interested think of the matter?" I asked.

"Well, I think she is quite in favor of it," he said. "Her father likes him, he will live in the old house, and she likes him,—at least, she asked me to do all in my power to bring him into the Church."

"The little puss," I could not help saying. "Who would ever have thought it? And yet, would it not be best? I pity her living with that old sea-dog,—that Viking in everything but his black mane of hair. But now, look here; this matter is important; let us talk it over quietly. Who or what is Ormsby? You have met him?"

"Several times. He is a young Trinity man, good-looking, gentlemanly, correct, moral. He has a pension of two hundred a year, his salary as Inspector of Coast Guards, and great expectations. But he has no faith."

"And never had any, I suppose. That's the way with all these fellows—"

"On the contrary, he was brought up a strict Evangelical, almost a Calvinist. Then he began to read, and like so many others he has drifted into unfaith."

"Well, lend him some books. He knows nothing, of course, about us. Let him see the faith, and he'll embrace it."

"Unfortunately, there's the rub. He has read everything. He has travelled the world; and reversing the venerable maxim, Coelum, non animum mutant, he has taken his faith from his climate. He has been a Theosophist in London, a 'New Light' in 'Frisco, as he calls it, a Moslem in Cairo (by the way, he thinks a lot of these Mussulmans,—fine, manly, dignified fellows, he says, whose eloquence would bring a blush almost to the cheek of a member of Parliament). Then he has been hand in glove with Buddhist priests in the forests of Ceylon, and has been awfully impressed with their secret power, and still more with their calm philosophy. I believe," said my curate, sinking his voice to a whisper of awe and mystery, "I believe—he has kissed—the—tooth—of—Buddha!"

"Indeed," I replied, "and what good did that operation do him?"

"Not much, I suppose, except to confirm him in that gospel of the sceptic: 'There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in our philosophy!'"

"Humph! Here, then, stands the case. Our most interesting little parishioner has set her heart on this globe-trotter. There is a big wall in the way, and it won't do to repeat the tragedy of Pyramus and Thisbe. Now, what is to be done to make the young fellow a Catholic? Has he any prejudices against us?"

"Not one? On the contrary, he rather likes us. He has received all kinds of hospitality from Catholic priests the wide world over, and he thinks us a right honest, jolly lot of fellows."

"H'm! I am not sure that that is exactly what St. Liguori or Charles Borromeo would fancy. But never mind! Now does he know what we hold and believe?"

"Accurately. He has read our best books."

"Has he had any intercourse with Catholics?"

"A good deal. They have not impressed him. Look at Campion now. Would any man become a Catholic with his example before him?"

"Hardly indeed, though we must speak kindly of him now, since you converted him. Had you any chat with him about his difficulties?"

"Yes, several. I walked home with him a few evenings from Campion's. You know that path over the cliff and down to the coast-guard station?"

"Well. And what is his special trouble? Does he think he has an immortal soul?"

"There you struck it. That's his trouble; and how to convince him of that beats me. I asked him again and again whether he was not self-conscious, that is, perfectly cognizant of the fact that there was a something, an Ego, outside and beyond the brain and inferior powers that commanded both? Was there not some intellectual entity that called up memory, and bade it unseal its tablets? And did he not feel and know that he could command and control the action of his brain, and even of every part of it? Now, I said, if the brain is only dumb matter, which you admit, and cannot create thought, where is this volition, or what is it? It is not cerebral, for then matter would create thought; that is, be the creator and the created at the same time."

"Well?"

"He listened attentively and then said quietly: 'Quite true. But if the Ego is different from the brain and is self-conscious, where does the self-consciousness go when the brain becomes anaemic and sleeps, or when the faculties are chloroformed?' 'Oh,' I said, 'the organ is shut down, the stops are closed.' 'Yes,' he said, 'but where goes the performer?' By Jove, I was stranded. I tell you what it is, Father Dan, though you'll call it treason, I'll pitch AEschylus to the mischief, and study what is of human and vital interest to us priests."

"That little objection needn't alarm you," I said, "you'll find the answer in every handbook of Catholic philosophy."

"What manual of Catholic philosophy in English could I get for Ormsby?" asked my curate.

"Alas! my dear young friend, I don't know. There is the great hiatus. You cannot put a folio calf-bound volume of Suarez in his hands,—he may not understand Latin. I know absolutely no book that you can put into the hands of an educated non-Catholic except Balmez's 'Letters to a Sceptic.'"

"He has read it," said my curate.

We were both silent.

"Now, you know," he continued, after a long pause, "I don't attach the least importance to these objections and arguments. I lived long enough in England to know that faith is a pure, absolutely pure gift of the Almighty, not to be acquired by learning or study, but possibly by prayer. I see, therefore, only one hope, and that is, in our Lord and His Blessed Mother."

"A profound and true remark," I replied, as he rose up to depart. "Get these mites of children to pray, and to say the Rosary for that particular purpose. I can't understand how God can refuse them anything."

"By the way," he said, as he put on his great coat, "it is a curious fact that, with all his incredulity, he is exceedingly superstitious. You can hardly believe how troubled he is about some gibberish of that old hag that sets charms for lame horses, etc. I'm not at all sure but that she set charms in the other way for my little mare."

"Well, what has she told Ormsby?"

"Her language was slightly oracular. Out of a joke, he crossed her palm with a sixpence. She looked him all over, though she knew well what he had in his mind, examined the lines of his hand minutely, and then delivered three Sibylline sentences:—

'Set a stout heart to a steep brae.'

That did not disconcert him. Then she said:—

'He that tholes, overcomes.'

He quite agreed with her. It was a naval simile, and it pleased him.

'But a white cloth and a stain never agree.'

He was struck as if by a blow. 'Mind you,' he said,'I am very candid. I have had my own faults and human weaknesses; but I never did anything immoral or dishonorable. What did she mean?' 'She meant,' I said, to reassure him, 'that you have kept her carefully out of the coast-guard station; that you have not allowed her to interfere with the men, or their wives, or their servants; that therefore you have put many a sixpence out of her pocket; and that she must have her revenge. Dismiss her jargon from your mind as soon as you can.' 'More easily said than done, Father,' he replied, and he then began to mutter: 'A white cloth and a stain never agree.' What does she mean?"

"The old story of Voltaire," I said, when my curate had finished. "Don't forget the children's prayers."

* * * * *

On Christmas eve he called at noonday, just as we were going out to the midday confessional. He had nothing new to tell. He was rather gloomy.

"You'll meet Miss Campion in the church," he said; "she'll tell you all."

"I don't think," I said, to cheer him—for where is the use of fretting in this queer world?—"there was so much need for Ormsby to go as far as Ceylon to find Buddha and the Nirvana. Look there."

Leaning against the blank wall opposite my house were three silent figures. They were a little distance apart, and they leaned against their support with the composure of three cabinet ministers on their green benches on the night of a great debate. Their feet were slightly parted, and they gazed on the road with a solemn, placid expression, as of men to whom the Atlantean weight of this weary world was as the down on a feather. Calmly and judicially, as if seeing nothing, yet weighing all things, they looked on pebble and broken limestone, never raising their heads, never removing their hands from their pockets. They had been there since breakfast time that morning, and it was now past noon.

"My God," said Father Letheby, when I told him, "'t is awful!"

"'T is the sublime," I said.

"And do you mean to tell me that they have never stirred from that posture for two long hours?"

"You have my word for it," I replied; "and you know the opinion entertained about my veracity,—'he'd no more tell a lie than the parish priest.'"

"I notice it everywhere," he said, in his impetuous way. "If I drive along the roads, my mare's head is right over the car or butt, before the fellow wakes up to see me; and then the exasperating coolness and deliberation with which he draws the reins to pull aside. My boy, too, when waiting on the road for a few minutes whilst I am attending a patient, falls fast asleep, like the fat boy in Pickwick; down there, under the cliffs, the men sleep all day in, or under, their boats. Why does not Charcot send all his nervous patients to Ireland? The air is not only a sedative, but a soporific. 'T is the calm of the eternal gods,—the sleep of the immortals."

"'T is the sleep of Enceladus in Etna," I replied. "When they wake up and turn, 't is hot lava and ashes."

"That's true, too," he said, musingly; "we are a strange people."

My own voice again echoing out of the dead past.

* * * * *

Miss Campion and "her friend from Dublin," Miss Leslie, were very busy about the Christmas decorations. Mrs. Darcy helped in her own way. I am afraid she did not approve of all that was being done. Miss Campion's and Mrs. Darcy's ideas of "the beautiful" were not exactly alike. Miss Campion's art is reticent and economical. Mrs. Darcy's is loud and pronounced. Miss Campion affects mosaics and miniatures. Mrs. Darcy wants a circus-poster, or the canvas of a diorama. Where Mrs. Darcy, on former occasions, put huge limbs of holly and a tangled wilderness of ivy, Miss Campion puts three or four dainty glistening leaves with a heart of red coral berries in the centre. Mrs. Darcy does not like it, and she thinks it her duty to art and religion to remonstrate.

"Wisha, Miss, I wouldn't be sparin' the holly if I was you. Sure 't is chape."

"Ah, well, now, Mrs. Darcy, don't you think this looks neat and pretty?"

"As nate and purty as yourself, Miss; but sure the parish priest won't mind the expinse. 'T is Christmas times, and his heart is open."

This wasn't too kind of Mrs. Darcy; but it does not matter. She looked ruefully at the fallen forest of greenery that strewed the chapel floor.

Miss Campion saw her distress, and said, kindly:—

"Now, Mrs. Darcy, is there any improvement you would kindly suggest before we conclude?"

"Wisha, Miss, there isn't much, indeed. You have made it lovely. But I'd like to see a little bit of holly in the Blessed Virgin's crown, and just a weeshy little bit in her Child's fingers. Sure, whatever is going these Christmas times, them have the best right to it."

Miss Campion smiled, and yielded to the pious wishes of the chapel woman, and then said:—

"Now, Mrs. Darcy, we'll put a few noble branches around the front porch, and whatever is left you must take it home, and let Jemmy decorate the dresser."

The first suggestion met Mrs. Darcy's tastes to perfection; the second went straight to her mother's heart.

"May God bless you, Miss; and may it be many a long day till throuble or sorrow crass the thrishol' of your dure."

The neighbors flocked in on Christmas eve to see Mrs. Darcy's cabin. Jemmy had risen to the occasion. The polished pewter vessels and the brass candlesticks shone resplendent from the background of black holly and veined ivy, and the red pearls of the berries. The comments, like all human criticisms, varied according to the subjectivity and prejudices of the visitors.

"Wisha, 't is purty, indeed. God bless those that gave it to the poor widow."

"Wisha, Jemmy, agra, there's no knowing what you'll be when you grows up."

"Wisha, thin, Mrs. Darcy, you wor always the good nabor. Would it be asking too much, ma'am, to give us thim few kippeens on the floor? Sure Abby says she'd like to have a little bit of holly to stick round the Infant Jesus this holy and blessed night."

"'T is aisy for some people to be proud. Aisy got, aisy gone. But 't is quare to be taking what ought to go to the house of God to make a babby-show for ourselves."

"Yerra, whisht, 'uman, we must hould our heads as high as we can while we have it. It may go soon, and Mary Darcy may wish to be no betther thin her nabors."

Ah me! Here is the great world in miniature.

"There is not a word of news going?" I said to Miss Campion, as we walked up and down the moss-covered walk that lay to the south side of the little church.

"Nothing, Father," she said, "except, indeed, that father makes his Christmas Communion in the morning; and oh! I am so thankful to God and to Father Letheby."

"It is really good news, Beata," I replied. I sometimes called her Beata, for Bittra sounds horrid. I intend to compromise on her wedding morn by calling her Beatrix. "Really good news. It will add considerably to the happiness of one, whose only object in life appears to be to make every one around her happy. But there is no other news that may be supposed to interest in a far-off way the old pastor, who gave Beata her First Communion, and—?"

She blushed crimson, and held down her head.

"Now," I said, "give your old parish priest your arm, for I am getting more and more feeble every day, and tell him all. Perhaps he could help you too."

"Oh, Father, if you could; but it is almost too much to expect from God. Perhaps I'd forget Him."

"Not much fear of that," I exclaimed fervently; "but now let us calculate the chances."

"But oh, Father, if you only knew Rex,—he is so good, so gentle, he takes so kindly to the poor, ("the clever rascal," I ejaculated under my breath,) and he likes us so much, I'm sure it needs but little to make him an excellent Catholic."

Well, now, what is a poor old man to do? Here am I, prepared to calculate and balance chances of this young man's conversion,—the pros and cons of a serious matter; and here this young lady branches off into a magnificent apotheosis of her young demigod! What has the cold yellow candle light of reason to do in the camera obscura of the human heart? Let us fling open the shutters, and let in the golden sunshine.

"So I've heard," I said. "And I also know this, Beata, that is, I've read something like it in good books, written by holy and thoughtful men, that the gift of faith is given freely by the Holy Spirit to those who, like your fiance, have led pure and unsullied lives."

She started at the word fiance, and the smile on her face was a study. Poor old Dante! no wonder you walked on air, and lightly spurned the stars, when your lady beckoned.

"Beatrice in suso, ed io in lei guardava."

So shall it be to the end.

Well, we talked the whole thing over; debated all possibilities, laughed at difficulties, cut through obstacles, leaped over obstructions, and, at last, saw in imagination, written on the cold, frosty air of December, the mystic legend, I WILL, surrounded by a gorgeous corona of orange blossoms.

Then, of course, the superb unreason of women. Beata began to cry as I handed her over to Miss Leslie, who looked daggers at me, and I am quite sure called me, in her own mind, "A horrid old thing!"

Father Letheby, after his unusually heavy confessional, was jubilant. Nothing exhilarates him like work. Given a scanty confessional, and he is as gloomy as Sisyphus; given a hard, laborious day, and he is as bright as Ariel. He was in uncommonly good spirits to-day.

"By Jove, Father Dan," he said, as we walked home together to our little bit of fish, "I have it. I'll try him with the Kampaner Thal!"

"The very thing," I replied.

"Don't you think it would do? You know he regards all our arguments as so much special pleading, and he discounts them accordingly."

"Of course," I said. "Wonder you never thought of it before!"

"That is curious now. But you always find things in unexpected quarters. But you're sure 't will do?"

"Quite sure. By the way, what is the Kampaner Thal?"

He looked squarely at me.

"'Pon my word, Father Dan, I confess I sometimes think you are rather fond of a joke."

"Come along, never mind," I replied. "After air and water, the power of a pleasant and kind word is the best and cheapest thing God gives us, His children."



CHAPTER XVI

VIOLENT CONTRASTS

Christmas Day was a day of undiluted triumph for Father Letheby. There were great surprises in store for me. That is one of my curate's few faults—is it a fault?—that he is inclined to be dramatic. As he says, he hates to speak of a thing until it is beyond the reach of failure. Of all criticisms, the one he most dreads is, "I told you so." And so, on this Christmas morning, I had a series of mild, pleasant shocks, that made the bright, crisp, frosty, sunny morning all the more pleasant. It was a slight, because expected, surprise to see Captain Campion at the altar rails. He appeared at eight o'clock Mass. Thanks be to God! I manage still to use the sublime privilege given by the Church that morning, of being allowed to celebrate three times. I have not omitted it for fifty years. When I shall fail to say my three Christmas Masses, then you may take up your Exequiae, and practise the Requiem aeternam for poor Daddy Dan.

Well, I had said the first two Masses, commencing at seven o'clock. It is a curious experience, that of seven o'clock Mass on Christmas morning. The groping through the dark, with just the faintest aurora on the horizon, the smell of the frost in the air, the crunching of icicles under one's feet, the shadowy figures, making their way with some difficulty to the church, the salutations of the people: "Is that you, Mick?" "'Tis, Mrs. Grady; a happy Christmas to you, ma'am." "The same to you, Mick, and manny of them." "Good morning, Mrs. Mulcahy; 't is a fine Christmas morning, glory be to God." "'T is indeed, ma'am, glory be to His Holy Name." "Hurry up, Bess, you'll never catch the priest at the altar." "Yerra, sure, haven't we three Masses to-day." The more polite people said: "The compliments of the saison to you, ma'am." "The same to you, sir; may we be all alive and happy this time twelvemonth."

Well, just as I commenced the hymn of the angels at my first Mass, there was a crash of music and singing from the gallery over the door, that made my old heart leap with joy and pride. I never expected it; and the soft tones of the harmonium, and the blending of the children's voices, floating out there in the dark of the little chapel, made tears of delight stream down the wrinkles of my cheeks. And what was the Gloria, do you think? From Mozart's "Twelfth Mass," if you please. Nothing else would do. The pride of Kilronan is gone so high since that famous concert, that I am almost sure they would challenge the seraphim to a fair contest, that is, if the latter would put aside their golden viols and sambucae, and compete only with their voices against the "new choir of Kilronan." I violated egregiously one strict rubric at the Dominus vobiscum. I raised my eyes and took a good long look at choir and people. I couldn't help it. If Martinucci and Baruffaldi, Gavantus and Merati, Gardellini and Bauldry, and the whole Congregation of Sacred Rites were there in the front bench, I couldn't help myself. I kept my hands open for at least a quarter of a minute, whilst I surveyed my little congregation. It was a pathetic sight. The lights from the altar shone on the faces of Captain Campion and Bittra, and one or two of the better-class parishioners on the front bench; but all behind were buried in a deep well of darkness. I could barely distinguish the pale faces of the confused mass that stretched in the deep gloom towards the door; but overhead, about a dozen dark figures were outlined against the light of the two wax candles on the harmonium, over which, on this eventful morning, Father Letheby presided. And this was the object of the concert at last. I should have known that there was some supernatural object behind it. This young man does not care much to develop or elicit the dormant energies of the people, unless he can turn therewith the mills of God. But what trouble it must have given him! How many a cold night did he leave his room, and there, on that gallery, contend with the rough and irregular voices, until he brought them into that stream of perfect unison. I can imagine what patience he exercised, what subtle flatteries he administered, what gentle sarcasm he applied, before he succeeded in modulating the hoarse thunders of Dave Olden's voice, that rose like a fog-horn over the winds and waves whenever he ventured upon the high seas; and how he cut off remorselessly the grace-notes of Abby Lyden, who has begun to think herself an Albani; and how he overcame the shyness of the fisher lads, and brought clear to the front the sweet tenors of the schoolboys, on whom, he said, all his hopes depended. And how his own rich baritone ascended strongly and softly over all, blending into perfect harmony all discordance, and gently smothering the vagrant and rebellious tones that would sometimes break ambitiously through discipline, and try to assert their own individuality. He sang an Offertory solo, accompanying himself on the harmonium. Who will say it was not sweet? Who will say it was not appropriate?

"O Vergine bella! Del ciel Regina, A cui s'inchina La terra ed el mar.

"O Tu che sei stella Del mare si bella, Ci guido nal porta Col tuo splendor."

And then when Bethlehem was repeated, with all its lowliness and humility, there in that humble chapel; and the Divine Babe lay white and spotless on the corporal, the glorious Adeste broke forth. Ah me! what a new experience for myself and people. Ah me! what a sting of compunction in all the honeyed delights of that glorious morning, to think that for all these years I had been pastor there. Well, never mind; mea maxima culpa! Ignosce, Domine!

I placed the Sacred Host on Captain Campion's tongue, and most heartily forgave him his unflattering epithets. Tears of joy streamed down Bittra's face as she knelt beside him at the altar rails. I was wearied and tired from the large number of Communions I administered that morning. The last communicant was poor Nance. She was hidden away in the deep gloom; but I am not at all sure that the Child Jesus did not nestle as comfortably in the arms of the poor penitent as in those of His virgins and spotless ones. And there were many such, thank God, amongst my Christmas congregation that morning.

But the great surprise of all was in store. For, after Mass was over, there was a great rush to St. Joseph's Chapel; and I am afraid I cut my own thanksgiving short, to move with silent dignity in the same direction. I heard gasps of surprise and delight, exclamations of wonder, suppressed hallelujahs of joy; I saw adoration and tenderness, awe and love on the dimly lighted faces of the people. No wonder! For there, under a rough, rustic roof of pines and shingles, was the Bethlehem of our imaginations in miniature. Rough rocks lined the interior, wet green mosses and lichens covering them here and there; in front of the cave a light hoar-frost lay on the ground, and straw and stubble littered the palace floor of Him who walks on the jasper and chalcedony parquetting of the floors of heaven. And there was the gentle Joseph, with a reverent, wondering look on his worn features; and there the conscious, self-possessed, but adoring expression on the sweet face of the Child-Mother; and there the helpless form and pleading hands of Him whose omnipotence stretches through infinity, and in whose fingers colossal suns and their systems are but the playthings of this moment in His eternal existence, which we call Time. Three shepherds stood around, dazed at some sudden light that shone from the face of the Infant; one, a boy, leaned forward as if to raise in his arms that sweet, helpless Babe; his hands were stretched towards the manger, and a string held the broad hat that fell between his shoulders. And aloft an angel held in his hand a starry scroll, on which was inscribed Gloria in excelsis Deo. I stood amongst my awestruck congregation for a few minutes. Some were kneeling, and uttering half-frantic ejaculations of adoration, pity, and love; some leaned against a pillar, silent, but with tearful eyes; little children pointed out to each other the different features of this new wonder-world; but all around, the fervid Celtic imagination translated these terracotta figures into living and breathing personalities. It was as if God had carried them back over the gulf of nineteen centuries, and brought them to the stable door of Bethlehem that ever memorable night. I think it is this realization of the Incarnation that constitutes the distinguishing feature of Catholicity. It is the Sacred Humanity of our Lord that brings Him so nigh to us, and makes us so familiar with Him; that makes the Blessed Eucharist a necessity, and makes the hierarchy of Bethlehem, Jerusalem, and Calvary so beloved,—beloved above all by the poor, and the humble, and the lowly. Listen to this!

"Oh, dear, dear, and to think of our Lord with the straw under Him, and His feet covered with the frost of that cowld night—"

"And the poor child! Look at her; why, she's only a little girl, like Norah; and not a woman near to help her in her throuble."

"Look at His little hands stretched out, like any ordinary child. Glory be to His Holy Name. Sure, only for Him where 'ud we be?"

"And poor St. Joseph! No wondher he's fretting. To think of thim two cratures in his hands, and he not having house or home to shelter thim!"

"Wisha, Mary, 't was a pity we worn't there that blessed night. Sure, 't is we'd give 'em the best we had in the world, an' our hearts' blood."

I shared to the full this feeling about St. Joseph. And when, after Father Letheby's Mass, I came down, and brought over my old arm-chair, and placed it in front of the crib, and put down my snuff-box, and my breviary, and my spectacles, and gave myself up to the contemplation of that wonderful and pathetic drama, St. Joseph would insist on claiming the largest share of my pity and sympathy. Somehow I felt that mother and child understood each other perfectly,—that she saw everything through the eyes of God, and that therefore there was not much room for wonderment; but that to St. Joseph the whole thing was an unspeakable mystery of humiliation and love, infinite abasement and infinite dignity; and I thought I saw him looking from the child-face of his spouse to the child-face of the Infant, and somehow asking himself, "What is it all?" even though he explicitly understood the meaning and magnitude of the mighty mystery.

Father Letheby has a new series of pictures of the Life of our Lord, painted by a French artist, whose name I can never recall except when I sneeze,—Tissot. I do not like them at all. They are too realistic,—and, after all, the ideal is the real. I have a special, undiluted dislike of one picture,—the Magnificat. I'd have torn it up, and put the fragments in the fire, but that it was not mine. But how in the world any Catholic could paint my beautiful child-prophetess of Hebron as Tissot has done baffles comprehension. But he has one lovely picture, "Because there was no Room." The narrow lane of the Jewish city,—the steep stairs to the rooms,—the blank walls perforated by a solitary, narrow window,—the rough stones, and the gentle animal that bore Mary, treading carefully over them,—the Jewish women, regretfully refusing admission,—the sweet, gentle face of the maiden mother,—and the pathetic, anxious, despairing look on the features of St. Joseph,—make this a touching and beautiful picture. Poor St. Joseph! "Come, take the reins of the patient animal, and lead him and his sacred burden out into the night! There is no room in the City of David for the children of David. Out under the stars, shining brilliantly through the frosty atmosphere, over the white, rugged road, into an unknown country, and 'Whither, O my God?' on thy lips, as the child at thy side shuddered, and no finger from heaven nor voice from earth directed thee; unless, indeed, that faint flashes of light athwart the net of stars told thee that the angels were cutting their way down through the darkness, and into the spheres of men, and that all heaven was in a tumult of expectation, whilst in yonder city men slept, as they always sleep unconscious when God is near. And then, when the feeble plaint broke from Mary's lips, I cannot go further, and the gentle beast turned aside into the rocks and whins, and called to his companions of the stable, and the meek-eyed ox looked calmly at the intruders, and there—there—dear God! to think of it all—In mundo erat, et mundus eum non cognovit."

I sat quietly there until Benediction at three o'clock, and then I remained rolling my beads through my fingers, and singing in my heart the grand majestic O's of the preceding day's offices, at the end of every decade, until five o'clock struck. From time to time my little children would come, and leaning on my knee, would gaze with wonder and affection at the Child of Bethlehem; and then, looking up into my face, put wonderful questions about deep mysteries to their old Father. For all day long, a stream of visitors passed before the crib; and the next day, and the next, crowds trooped over from Moydore and the neighboring parishes, for the fame of it had gone abroad over the land; and men and women came, jealous of their own pastors, and wondering at the sudden uprise of Kilronan. Then the climax was reached on the twelfth day, when the Kings appeared, and the group in the stable was complete. The "black man" from Nubia came in for more than his share of honors; and it was admitted all round that Kilronan was immortalized and the other parishes were forever in the background.

"May God bless the man that gave us such a sight," said an old woman fervently, as I left the wondering crowd and went home to dinner.

"May God bless all our priests," said another, fearing that I might be offended.

"Wisha, thin, Father Dan," said a third, "what a wondher you never tould us what you had in store for us. Wisha, thin, it wasn't worth while keeping it such a grate sacret."

There is no end to the ingenious charity of these people. On my plate at the dinner table, amidst a pile of Christmas cards, was a dainty little duodecimo. I took it up. It was from Father Letheby. And what was it? The Imitation in Greek, by a certain George Mayr, S. J. Wasn't this nice? My pet book done into my favorite language! It was the happiest Christmas I ever spent. Quam bonus Israel Deus! So too said Father Letheby. But I had some dim presentiment that all his well-merited pleasure would not be quite unalloyed,—that some secret hand, perhaps a merciful one, would pluck a laurel leaf or two from his crown. We had a pleasant academic discussion after dinner about the honorable retention of ancient Irish customs,—he quite enthusiastic about them, I rather disposed to think that the abuses which invariably accompanied them made their final extinction altogether advisable. We put our respective theories in practice next morning with the most perfect consistency; for Hannah drove indignantly from the door the wren-boys, just as they were commencing:

"A thrate, a thrate, if of the best, We hope in heaven your sowl will rest; But if you give it of the small It won't agree with our boys at all."

And, on his part, Father Letheby listened with intense delight to this dithyrambic, which ushers in St. Stephen's day all over Ireland; and he dispensed sundry sixpences to the boys with the injunction to be always good Irishmen and to buy sweets.

That night, just as I was thinking of retiring, for I am an early riser, I heard a gentle tap at the hall door, then a hurried colloguing in the hall; and Hannah put in her head and whispered:—

"Lizzie is afraid, sir, that the priest is sick. Would you mind coming down to see him?"

"God bless me! no," I said, quite alarmed. I followed the servant rapidly and was ushered into Father Letheby's parlor, unexpected and almost unannounced.

"What's the matter, sir?" he cried; "what's the matter?"

"Nothing particular," I replied. "'T is a rather fine night, is it not?"

"Lizzie must have sent for you?" he answered.

"Yes," I said, "she did. She thought you were unwell. Are you?"

He looked ill enough, poor fellow, and at these words he sank wearily into a chair.

"I am afraid you're unwell," I repeated.

"I'm not unwell," he said, blubbering like a child, "but—but—my heart is broken."

"Oh," I cried, "if that's all, it's easily mended. Come now, let's hear all, and see if we can't put the pieces together."

"I wouldn't mind," he cried, standing up and striding along the little room, his hands tightly clasped behind his back, "but the poor little altar boys—the poor little beggars—they looked so nice yesterday, and oh to think of it! Good God!"

"Very dramatic, very dramatic," I said, "but not the quiet narrative and consecutive style that I affect. Now, supposing you told me the story. There's balm in Gilead yet."

And this was the story, told with much impressiveness, a fair amount of gesticulation, and one or two little profane expressions, which made the Recording Angel cough and look away to see how was the weather.

It appears that about seven o'clock Father Letheby had a sick-call outside the village. There are generally a fair share of sick-calls on the day succeeding the great festivity, for obvious reasons. He was returning home through the village, when the sound of singing arrested his steps just outside Mrs. Haley's public house. His heart gave a bound of delight as he heard the familiar lines and notes of the Adeste. "Thank God!" he said, "at last, the people are beginning to bring our Catholic hymns into their own homes." As he listened intently there was a slight reaction as he recognized the sweet liquid notes, with all the curls and quavers that are the copyright and strictly legal and exclusive possession of Jem Deady.

"Good heavens!" said the young priest, in a frenzy of indignation, "has that ruffian dared to introduce into the taproom our Christmas melodies, and to degrade them into a public-house chorus?"

He stepped into the shop. There was no one there. He turned softly the handle of the door, and was in the taproom for several minutes before he was recognized. What he witnessed was this. Leaning in a tipsy, maudlin way against the wall were the holly bushes, which, decorated with pink ribbons, and supposed to conceal in their dim recesses the "wren, the wren, the king of all birds," had been the great attraction of the morning. Leaning on the deal table, with glasses and pints of porter before them, as they sat and lounged or fell in various stages of intoxication, were the wren-boys; and near the fire, with his back turned to the door, and his fingers beating time to the music in pools of dirty porter, was Jem Deady. As Father Letheby entered he was singing:—