The Emigrants Of Ahadarra. William Carleton

are you at work now?”

      “In Glendearg, above.”

      “Well, then, if you can't come to me, I must only go to you. Will you be there tonight? I wish to speak to you on very particular business.”

      “Shiss; you will, dhin, wanst more?” asked the other, significantly.

      “I think so.”

      “Shiss—ay—vary good. Fwen will she come?”

      “About eleven or twelve; so don't be from about the place anywhere.”

      “Shiss—dhin—vary good. Is dhat all?”

      “That's all now. Are your turf dry or wet* to-day?”

      * One method of selling Poteen is by bringing in kishes of

       turf to the neighboring markets, when those who are up to

       the secret purchase the turf, or pretend to do so; and while

       in the act of discharging the load, the Keg of Poteen is

       quickly passed into the house of him who purchases the

       turf.—Are your turf wet or dry? was, consequently, a pass-

       word.

      “Not vary dhry,” replied Ted, with a grin so wide that, as was humorously said by a neighbor of his, “it would take a telescope to enable a man to see from the one end of it to the other.”

      Hycy nodded and laughed, and Ted, cracking his whip, proceeded up the town to sell his turf.

      Hycy now sauntered about through the market, chatting here and there among acquaintances, with the air of a man to whom neither life nor anything connected with it could occasion any earthly trouble. Indeed, it mattered little what he felt, his easiness of manner was such that not one of his acquaintances could for a moment impute to him the possibility of ever being weighed down by trouble or care of any kind; and lest his natural elasticity of spirits might fail to sustain this perpetual buoyancy, he by no means neglected to fortify himself with artificial support. Meet him when or where you might, be it at six in the morning or twelve at night, you were certain to catch from his breath the smell of liquor, either in its naked simplicity or disguised and modified in some shape.

      His ride home, though a rapid, was by no means a pleasing one. M'Mahon had not only refused to lend him the money he stood in need of, but actually quarrelled with him, as far as he could judge, for no other purpose but that he might make the quarrel a plea for refusing him. This disappointment, to a person of Hycy's disposition, was, we have seen, bitterly vexatious, and it may be presumed that he reached home in anything but an agreeable humor. Having dismounted, he was about to enter the hall-door, when his attention was directed towards that of the kitchen by a rather loud hammering, and on turning his eyes to the spot he found two or three tinkers very busily engaged in soldering, clasping, and otherwise repairing certain vessels belonging to that warm and spacious establishment. The leader of these vagrants was a man named Philip Hogan, a fellow of surprising strength and desperate character, whose feats of hardihood and daring had given him a fearful notoriety over a large district of the country. Hogan was a man whom almost every one feared, being, from confidence, we presume, in his great strength, as well as by nature, both insolent, overbearing, and ruffianly in the extreme. His inseparable and appropriate companion was a fierce and powerful bull-dog of the old Irish breed, which he had so admirably trained that it was only necessary to give him a sign, and he would seize by the throat either man or beast, merely in compliance with the will of his master. On this occasion he was accompanied by two of his brothers, who were, in fact, nearly as impudent and offensive ruffians as himself. Hycy paused for a moment, seemed thoughtful, and tapped his boot with the point of his whip as he looked at them. On entering the parlor he found dinner over, and his father, as was usual, waiting to get his tumbler of punch.

      “Where's my mother?” he asked—“where's Mrs. Burke?”

      On uttering the last words he raised his voice so as she might distinctly hear him.

      “She's above stairs gettin' the whiskey,” replied his father, “and God knows she's long enough about it.”

      Hycy ran up, and meeting her on the lobby, said, in a low, anxious voice—

      “Well, what news? Will he stand it?”

      “No,” she replied, “you may give up the notion—he won't do it, an' there's no use in axin' him any more.”

      “He won't do it!” repeated the son; “are you certain now?”

      “Sure an' sartin. I done all that could be done; but it's worse an' worse he got.”

      Something escaped Hycy in the shape of an ejaculation, of which we are not in possession at present; he immediately added:—

      “Well, never mind. Heavens! how I pity you, ma'am—to be united to such a d—d—hem!—to such a—a—such a—gentleman!”

      Mrs. Burke raised her hands as if to intimate that it was useless to indulge in any compassion of the kind.

      “The thing's now past cure,” she said; “I'm a marthyr, an' that's all that's about it. Come down till I get you your dinner.”

      Hycy took his seat in the parlor, and began to give a stave of the “Bay of Biscay:”—

      “'Loud roar'd the dreadful thunder,

       The rain a deluge pours;

       The clouds were rent asunder

       By light'ning's vivid—'

      By the way, mother, what are those robbing ruffians, the Hogans, doing at the kitchen door there?”

      “Troth, whatever they like,” she replied. “I tould that vagabond, Philip, that I had nothing for them to do, an' says he, 'I'm the best judge of that, Rosha Burke.' An, with that he walks into the kitchen, an' takes everything that he seen a flaw in, an' there he and them sat a mendin' an' sotherin' an' hammerin' away at them, without ever sayin' 'by your lave.'”

      “It's perfectly well known that they're robbers,” said Hycy, “and the general opinion is that they're in connection with a Dublin gang, who are in this part of the country at present. However, I'll speak to the ruffians about such conduct.”

      He then left the parlor, and proceeding to the farmyard, made a signal to one of the Hogans, who went down hammer in hand to where he stood. During a period of ten minutes, he and Hycy remained in conversation, but of what character it was, whether friendly or otherwise, the distance at which they stood rendered it impossible for any one to ascertain. Hycy then returned to dinner, whilst his father in the meantime sat smoking his pipe, and sipping from time to time at his tumbler of punch. Mrs. Burke, herself, occupied an arm-chair to the left of the fire, engaged at a stocking which was one of a pair that she contrived to knit for her husband during every twelve months; and on the score of which she pleaded strong claims to a character of most exemplary and indefatigable industry.

      “Any news from the market, Hycy?” said his father.

      “Yes,” replied Hycy, in that dry ironical tone which he always used to his parents—“rather interesting—Ballymacan is in the old place.”

      “Bekaise,” replied his father, with more quickness than might be expected, as he whiffed away the smoke with a face of very sarcastic humor; “I hard it had gone up a bit towards the mountains—but I knew you wor the boy could tell me whether it had or not—ha!—ha!—ha!”

      This rejoinder, in addition to the intelligence Hycy had just received from his mother, was not calculated to improve his temper. “You may laugh,” he replied; “but if your respectable father had treated you in a spirit so stingy and beggarly as that which I experience at your hands, I don't know how you might have borne it.”

      “My father!” replied Burke; “take your time, Hycy—my hand to you, he