master's blarney deprive you of it, otherwise it will be a _vale,
vale, longum vale_ between you. _Crede experto!_"

"Masther," said the farmer, "many a sthrange accident you met wid on yer
thravels through Munsther?"

"No doubt of that, Mr. Lanigan. I and another boy thravelled it in
society together. One day we were walking towards a gintleman's house
on the road side, and it happened that we met the owner of it in the
vicinity, although we didn't know him to be such.

"'_Salvete Domini!_' said he, in good fresh Latin.

"'_Tu sis salvus, quoque!_' said I to him, for my comrade wasn't cute,
an' I was always orathor.

"'_Unde veniti?_' said he, comin' over us wid another deep piece of
larnin' the construction of which was, 'where do yez come from?'

"I replied, '_Per varios casus et tot discrimina rerum, venimus a
Mayo._'

"'Good!' said he, 'you're bright; follow me.'

"So he brought us over to his own house, and ordered us bread and cheese
and a posset; for it was Friday, an' we couldn't touch mate. He, in the
mane time, sat an chatted along wid us. The thievin' cook, however, in
makin' the posset, kept the curds to herself, except a slight taste here
and there, that floated on the top; but she was liberal enough of the
whey, any how.

"Now I had been well trained to fishing in my more youthful days; and no
gorsoon could grope a trout wid me. I accordingly sent the spoon through
the pond before me wid the skill of a connoisseur; but to no purpose--it
came up wid nothin' but the whey.

"So, said I off hand to the gintleman, houlding up the bowl, and looking
at it with a disappointed face,

'Apparent _rari_ nantes in gurgite vasto.'

'This,' says I, 'plase your hospitality, may be Paotolus, but the divil
a taste o' the proper sand is in the bottom of it.'

"The wit of this, you see, pleased him, and we got an excellent treat
in his _studium_, or study: for he was determined to give myself another
trial.

"'What's the wickedest line in Virgil?' said he.

"Now I had Virgil at my fingers' ends, so I answered him:

'Flectere si nequeo superos, Aeheronta movebo,'

"'Very good,' said he, 'you have the genius, and will come to somethin'
yet: now tell me the most moral line in Virgil.'

"I answered:

'Discere justitiam moniti et non temnere divos.' *

* He is evidently drawing the long-bow here; this
anecdote has been told before.

"'Depend upon it,' said he, 'you will be a luminary. The morn