a gray, with that swinging low cantering
action Miss Kennyfeck likes; she rides so well! I wish she 'd try him."

A shake of the head and a bland smile intimated a mild refusal.

"Inexorable father! Come, Cashel, you shall make the _amende_ for having
given away my cottage; you must buy Reginald and make him a present to
the lady."

"Agreed," said Cashel; "send him over to-day; he's mine, or rather Miss
Kennyfeck's. Nay, sir, really I will not be opposed. Mr. Kennyfeck, I
insist."

The worthy attorney yielded, but not without reluctance, and saw them
depart, with grave misgivings that the old doctor's sentiment was truly
spoken, and that Linton's companionship was a most unhappy accident.

"I must get into Parliament," said Linton, as he seated himself beside
Cashel in the phaeton, "if it were only to quote you as one of that
much-belied class, the Irish landlord. The man who grants renewals of
his best land on terms contracted three hundred years ago is very much
wanted just now. What a sensation it would create in the House when
they cry, 'Name, name,' and I reply that I am under a positive personal
injunction not to name, and then Sharman Crawford, or one of that set,
rises and avers that he believed the honorable and learned gentleman's
statement to be perfectly unfounded. Amid a deluge of 'Ohs!' I stand up
and boldly declare that further reserve is no longer possible, and that
the gentleman whom I am so proud to call my friend is Roland Cashel,
Esq., of Tubbennore. There 's immortality for you, for that evening
at any rate. You 'll be toasted at Bellamy's at supper, and by the
white-headed old gentlemen who sit in the window at the Carlton."

"You'll not hint that I had already made a present of the lands when I
displayed so much munificence," said Cashel, smiling.

"Not a syllable; but I'll tell the secret to the Opposition, if you ever
grow restive," said Linton, with a laugh, in which, had Roland studied
Lavater, he might have read a valuable lesson.

"_A propos_ of Parliament, Kennyfeck persists in boring me about it, and
that Mr. Downie Meek seems to have it at heart that I am to represent
something or somebody, well knowing, the while, that I cannot possibly
be supposed to understand anything of the interests whereon I should be
called to vote and legislate."

"That 's not so much consequence," said Linton; "you 'd find a very
strong section of the House very like yourself, but the thing would
bore