lt for the like of them.'

'You prefer Ireland, then, Corny?'

'Who said I did?' said he snappishly; 'isn't it as bad there? Ugh,
ugh! the Captain won't rest aisy in his grave after the way he
treated me--leaving me here alone and dissolate in this place, amongst
strangers!'

'Well, you must confess the country is not so bad.'

'And why would I confess it? What's in it that I don't mislike? Is it
the heap of houses and the smoke and the devil's noise that's always
going on that I'd like? Why isn't it peaceful and quiet like Dublin?'

And as I conversed further with him, I found that all his dislikes
proceeded from the discrepancy he everywhere discovered from what he
had been accustomed to in Ireland, and which, without liking, he still
preferred to our Saxon observances--the few things he saw worthy of
praise being borrowed or stolen from his own side of the Channel And in
this his ingenuity was striking, insomuch that the very trees in Woburn
Park owed their goodness to the owner having been once a Lord Lieutenant
in Ireland, where, as Corny expressed it, 'devil thank him to have fine
trees! hadn't he the pick of the Fhaynix?'

I knew that candour formed a most prominent feature in Mr. Delany's
character, and consequently had little difficulty in ascertaining his
opinion of every member of my family; indeed, to do him justice, no one
ever required less of what is called pumping. His judgment on things and
people flowed from him without effort or restraint, so that ere half
an hour elapsed he had expatiated on my mothers pride and vanity,
apostrophised my father's hastiness and determination, and was quite
prepared to enter upon a critical examination of my cousin Julia's
failings, concerning whom, to my astonishment, he was not half so
lenient as I expected.

'Arrah, isn't she like the rest of them, coorting one day with Captain
Phil, and another with the young lord there, and then laughing at them
both with the ould duke that comes here to dinner! She thinks I don't
be minding her; but didn't I see her taking myself off one day on
paper--making a drawing of me, as if I was a haste! Mayhe there's worse
nor me,' said the little man, looking down upon his crooked shins and
large knee-joints with singular complacency; 'and mayhe she'd get one
of them yet.' A harsh cackle, the substitute for a laugh, closed this
speech.

'Breakfast on the table, sir,' said a servant, tapping gently at the
door.

'I'll engage i