s on her hand, and her knuckles
were bleeding, and it was said 'twas poor Mrs. Nutter going away with
the keepers to a mad-house.'

Toole turned pale and ground his teeth, looking towards Dublin.

'I passed it myself near Island-bridge; I did hear screeching, but I
thought 'twas from t'other side of the wall. There was a fellow in an
old blue and silver coat with the driver--eh?'

'The same,' said the boy; and Toole, with difficulty swallowing down his
rage, hurried into the house, resolved to take Lowe's advice on the
matter, and ready to swear to poor Sally's perfect sanity--'the
crature!--the villains!'

But now he had only a moment to pull off his boots, to get into his
grand costume, and seize his cane and his muff, too--for he sported one;
and so transformed and splendid, he marched down the paved
_trottoir_--Doctor Pell happily not yet arrived--to Sturk's house. There
was a hackney coach near the steps.

CHAPTER XCV.

IN WHICH DOCTOR PELL DECLINES A FEE, AND DOCTOR STURK A PRESCRIPTION.

In entering the front parlour from whence, in no small excitement, there
issued the notes of a course diapason, which he fancied was known to
him, he found Mr. Justice Lowe in somewhat tempestuous conference with
the visitor.

He was, in fact, no other than Black Dillon; black enough he looked just
now. He had only a moment before returned from a barren visit to the
Brass Castle, and was in no mood to be trifled with.

''Twasn't _I_, Sir, but Mr. Dangerfield, who promised you five hundred
guineas,' said Mr. Lowe, with a dry nonchalance.

'Five hundred fiddles,' retorted Doctor Dillon--his phrase was coarser,
and Toole at that moment entering the door, and divining the situation
from the doctor's famished glare and wild gestures, exploded, I'm sorry
to say in a momentary burst of laughter, into his cocked hat. 'Twas
instantly stifled, however; and when Dillon turned his flaming eyes upon
him, the little doctor made him a bow of superlative gravity, which the
furious hero of the trepan was too full of his wrongs to notice in any
way.

'I was down at his house, bedad, the "Brass Castle," if you plase, and
not a brass farthin' for my pains, nothing there but an ould woman, as
ould and as ugly as himself, or the divil--be gannies! An' he's
levanted, or else tuck for debt. Brass Castle! brass _forehead_, bedad.
Brass, like Goliath, from head to heels; an' by the heels he's laid,
I'll take my davy, considherin' at