That evening was a decided improvement on many preceding ones. Vincent was so full of vital energy that he imparted it to more torpid temperaments, and with a boyish audaciousness of manner, got everyone in the house from the Madam to the smallest servant, to do exactly as he liked. Ethna was forced, in spite of herself, to sing, play, and laugh at his gay sallies. Nora was danced about after a fashion that caused her to emit the wildest shrieks. The very dogs felt it to be a privileged hour; they gambolled along the halls and chased round the parlour table with unwonted forwardness. The young man's advent had the same effect upon the dispirited household as a fresh breeze upon nature awaking life and motion. Mona required the stimulus, for it had become somewhat dulled, as every household will by the gloomy depression of one of its members.

Very few think it necessary to make an effort to be at home what they are abroad; the smiles are kept for the outside, and the gentle words for acquaintances; the snappish reply and stupid apathy for the fireside. With what polite attention we listen to the wearisome platitudes of Mr. and Mrs. Unbearably Tiresome; with what little scruple we contradict, sneer at, and otherwise maltreat the observations of our nearest and dearest! With what ready politeness we pick up the handkerchief, glove or ball of thread for the old lady next door; we like to show our respect for old age; we spring across the room to save her rheumatic backbone; but our domesticated aged relatives are a different species of ancient architecture for which a little exercise is considered beneficial. This adaptation of manner to the external relations of life is not conscious, but rather instinctive hypocrisy ; and curiously enough, though it is an accepted article of social faith that the generality of people are not so agreeable at home as abroad, they are nevertheless judged by this agreeableness of manner. A father will hold up the young man who has listened deferentially to his ideas on local legislature, as an example to his sons who he fancies are inclined to look upon the counsels of the elders with unholy disregard. The mother will irritate the hot young hearts of her daughters, who are as good and as pliably demonstrative as the generality of thoughtless young people, by holding up other daughters in bold relief for being, "Oh, so nice and pleasant and useful about the house, never giving their mother a bit of trouble." The parents of these model examples will have exactly the same

cause for complaint, and the same tendency to underrate and overrate the perfectibility and imperfectibility of the personalities that fill their quivers.

A family of cousins once confided to each other the deep and deadly hatred with which their youthful breasts were animated at one time for the supposed supernatural virtue of each, and the manner in which that virtue was used, not alone as a whip but a very scorpion to flagellate them for their shortcomings.

""Tis a long time till the Bewley girls would do such a thing; see how useful they are and how they mind their clothes," says one mother.

"Ah, 'tis well for you, Mrs. Graymore, to have such daughters," says mother number two. "What gentle good girls they are, how obedient to their parents!"

Yes; we are all unconsciously hypocritical, and turn the nicest phase of our natures, or a seemingly nice phase to that side where stand the most intolerant and the greatest number of observers ; those at home are bound to put up with us as we really are.

Next day, Vincent, the two ladies, and little Norah drove to Monalena to Mass. Vincent had a word for everyone he met on the road, from the children, round whose necks he curled the lash of the whip, to the bent, frieze-coated, old men, who paused to to rest upon their sticks; all smiled as they recognized him, and made their comments as he passed, which comments were very favourable, indeed, to the light-hearted young attorney.

The great act of religion was performed, and human creatures knelt before God in their various attitudes. The Madam knelt absorbed in prayer; Vincent less spiritual, but entirely reverent and recollected, read his prayers beside her. Ethna mechanically turned the leaves of her book, but they now bore no divine meaning to her mind; the breath of passion had dimmed the mirror of her soul. It is only the tranquil lake that reflects the ethereal beauty of the serene heavens, and as yet the girl would not bring her wounded heart to the feet of Him who had Himself found earthly love so unstable. When Mass was over, they met Father O'Malley. It was agreed that Vincent should go off with him on a call up the mountains, and Nell should return with the Madam and Ethna.

Father Garrett O'Malley was an open-hearted, impulsive nature, full of noble aspiration and enthusiasm for good, whether

temporal or eternal. He had a most beneficial influence over the young men of his parish; he repressed them, and he instigated them; he unsparingly pruned them to give them growth; he encouraged them at all manly sports, but anyone caught cardplaying, or at a night dance, felt the full force of Father Garrett's indignation. He was scarcely thirty years old, a fine broadshouldered young man, with an intelligent face, and an enormous capacity for wearing out his clothes.

His only sister Nellie-indeed save for a brother, abroad, his only living relative-was a tiny edition of himself. She was a small, dark girl, with pretty brown eyes, looking out of a piquant, rather eager little face; standing on her feet with the buoyant lightness of a robin redbreast, ready apparently to take wing up and down, in and out, without feeling her body the least weight upon her soul.

She was the most useful and hopeful little person to be found. Work was play to her. Annoyances were to be borne, impediments overcome, contrivances achieved, everything made the best of. With the assistance of an old woman she did the business of her brother's house, made the butter of her one cow, minded her flowers, made up her muslins, and kept herself and her surroundings in the prettiest order. She came to live with her brother when she left school a few years before, and when he had been sent to Monalena. He took a little cottage just at the end of the village. She had the interest of a few hundred pounds, and so they contrived to housekeep on a very modest scale. But if their means were limited, so were their desires, and they managed to get along comfortably and perfectly content. A few of the opposite sex, allured by Nellie's winsome little face and figure, made tender overtures. But the small maiden was unimpressionable, and only retained a memory of the wooer to heartlessly mimic his oblique looks and words of soft import for the benefit of Father Garrett, who would burst forth into one of his joyful laughs.

"But, Nell my girl, you must marry and settle down some time," he would say, "as you are going to remain in the world."

"I am settled as much as I want to be settled," Nell would

answer.

"But I may die, Neil."

'Well, and is not a husband mortal? May not he die too?" answers Nell. "It often amuses me to hear people say, 'it is a pity she is not settled,' 'it is so well to have her settled,' as if marriage gave them a new lease of the world, and the things thereof. I think people are often as unsettled after marriage as before it, and as often left badly off. Husbands are fallible. They die, and

they smash up."

"What a prudent virgin you are," says Father Garrett. "People must trust in God instead of anticipating misfortune. It is He that gives us the sun and the rain, the good and the bad."

"Well, that is just what I am doing," Nellie would reply. "Consequently I'll never be alarmed about being settled in life. I feel quite sufficiently rooted, and the idea of my being as fond of any man as I am of you is simply laughable."

CHAPTER XXII.

CHEAP JACK'S COMPANION.

That evening they had a pleasant dinner at Mona. Mr. Taylor had been from home on business since the time of the races, and as the business had been successfully concluded, he had returned in the best possible spirits.

"Well, Father Garrett, have you a nest of Fenians anywhere on the mountains ?" said he, when the cloth had been removed. "They are becoming nervous in some quarters; nervous old ladies expect to be robbed and murdered. The Fenians are the topic

of the city."

"No doubt but the disaffection is spreading," answered Father Garrett; "some people fancy Father Gallagher is getting softening of the brain, he talks so much against secret societies lately."

"I'll fight if I get an open," said Vincent. "I am just the fellow to put the green above the red."

"More easy said than done," answered the priest. "I'd give my life for my country, myself, but what is the use of attempting impossibilities? "

""Tis rank nonsense," said Mr. Taylor, "utter folly to think

VOL. XXV. No. 292.

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of fighting England with powder and ball. Aren't half-a-dozen policemen able to hunt a mob? I have no patience with such headless attempts."

"Why not get enough of powder and ball to blow the enemy into kingdom come?" replied Vincent, peacefully sipping his punch. "I haven't got the organ of constructiveness. I'm no good to plan an attack; but as the American fellow said to his leader I'll storm hell if you plan it.""

"Mr. Taylor is right-they are headless attempts," said Father Garrett," and bring but sin and ruin in their train; yet I can sympathise with those rash but noble natures who have flung aside all personal ends in their desire for liberty."

"The persons who carry patriotism so far are usually those who have nothing to lose," answered Mr. Taylor.

"And the people who denounce the wisdom of patriotism are usually those who have something to lose," exclaimed Father Garrett, laughing, "which argues as badly for them."

"What makes liberty impossible?" said Vincent, in a lofty voice. "Craven spirits like those around me. If we had the strength of unity, who could withstand us? But one man is satisfied as he is; another is afraid; a third is indifferent; a fourth is incredulous; and a fifth advances himself by betraying me-that's the way in all the nations of the world, and the question is are they worth being regenerated at all? I say they are not, and I'll go instead and devote myself to the girls.” Vincent left the room, and he was soon heard playing the piano with more vigour than sweetness. Father Garrett and Mr. Taylor continued talking seriously over many things until they were summoned to tea.

Next morning Vincent was down early to breakfast, and to go on the mountains with Father Garrett, but the latter had a sick call and it was almost ten o'clock before he returned, Nell was in and out about her business, having an occasional word for the impatient guest who anathematised all the sick old women in the parish.

"It is not an old woman at all," said Nell. "When anything crosses a man he is sure to try to trace it to a women; it is an old man, Mr. Talbot."

"I don't believe it," answered Vincent; "I don't believe a word of it; it is not in the nature of a man to behave so un