ing the
house, but Murtagh begging them to stay to supper, they consented. After
supper, at which the guests drank rather freely, Murtagh said that, as he
had not the least wish to win their money, he intended to give them their
revenge; he would not play at cards with them, he added, but at a funny
game of thimbles, at which they would be sure of winning back their own;
then going out, he brought in a table, tall and narrow, on which placing
certain thimbles and a pea, he proposed that they should stake whatever
they pleased on the almost certainty of finding the pea under the
thimbles. The leaders, after some hesitation, consented, and were at
first eminently successful, winning back the greater part of what they
had lost; after some time, however, Fortune, or rather Murtagh, turned
against them, and then, instead of leaving off, they doubled and trebled
their stakes, and continued doing so until they had lost nearly the whole
of their funds. Quite furious, they now swore that Murtagh had cheated
them, and insisted on having their property restored to them. Murtagh,
without a word of reply, went to the door, and shouting into the passage
something in Irish, the room was instantly filled with bogtrotters, each
at least six feet high, with a stout shillelah in his hand. Murtagh then
turning to his guests, asked them what they meant by insulting an
anointed priest; telling them that it was not for the likes of them to
avenge the wrongs of Ireland. "I have been clane mistaken in the whole
of ye," said he, "I supposed ye Irish, but have found, to my sorrow, that
ye are nothing of the kind; purty fellows to pretend to be Irish, when
there is not a word of Irish on the tongue of any of ye, divil a
ha'porth; the illigant young gentleman to whom I taught Irish, in
Dungarvon times of old, though not born in Ireland, has more Irish in him
than any ten of ye. He is the boy to avenge the wrongs of Ireland, if
ever foreigner is to do it." Then saying something to the bogtrotters,
they instantly cleared the room of the young Irelanders, who retired
sadly disconcerted; nevertheless, being very silly young fellows, they
hoisted the standard of rebellion; few, however, joining them, partly
because they had no money, and partly because the priests abused them
with might and main, their rebellion ended in a lamentable manner;
themselves being seized and tried, and though convicted, not deemed of
sufficient importance to be sent to