d t' m'self,
'Begorra, if a wee fella turns _up_ whin Anthrim turns 'im out it's
little credit t' Anthrim I'm thinkin'!'"

Anna laughed and Jamie, putting his hand behind his ear, asked:

"What's that--what's that?"

The name and remarks of the gentleman who seconded the vote of thanks
were repeated to him.

"Ha, ha, ha!" he laughed as he slapped me on the knee. "Well, well,
well, if that wudn't make a brass monkey laugh!"

"Say," he said to me, "d'ye mind th' night ye come home covered wi'
clabber--"

"Whisht!" I said, as I put my mouth to his ear. "I only want to mind
that he had three very beautiful daughters!"

"Did ye iver spake t' aany o' thim?" Jamie asked.

"Yes."

"Whin?"

"When I sold them papers."

"Ha, ha, a ha'penny connection, eh?"

"It's betther t' mind three fine things about a maan than wan mean
thing, Jamie," Anna said.

"If both o' ye's on me I'm bate," he said.

"Stop yer palaver an' let's haave a story ov th' war wi' th' naygars in
Egypt," Mrs. Hurll said.

"Aye, that's right," one of the Gainer boys said. "Tell us what th'
queen give ye a medal fur!"

They wanted a story of blood, so I smeared the tale red. When I finished
Anna said, "Now tell thim, dear, what ye tuk th' shillin' fur!"

"You tell them, mother."

"Ye tuk it t' fight ignorance an' not naygars, didn't ye?"

"Yes, but that fight continues."

"Aye, with you, but--"

"Ah, never mind, mother, I have taken it up where you laid it down, and
long after--" that was far as I got, for Jamie exploded just then and
said:

"Now get t' h--l home, ivery wan o' ye, an' give 's a minute wi' 'im
jist for ourselves, will ye?"

He said it with laughter in his voice and it sounded in the ears of
those present as polite and pleasing as anything in the domain of their
amenities.

They arose as one, all except Withero, and he couldn't, for Jamie
gripped him by a leg and held him on the floor just as he sat.

In their good-night expressions the neighbors unconsciously revealed
what the lecture and the story meant to them. Summed up it meant, "Sure
it's jist wondtherful ye warn't shot!"

When we were alone, alone with Withero, Mary "wet" a pot of tea and
warmed up a few farrels of fadges! and we commenced. Little was said,
but feeling ran high. It was like a midnight mass. Anna was silent, but
there were tears, and as I held her in my arms and kissed them away
Jamie was saying to Withero:

"Ye might take 'im fur a dandthe