erved that it was getting late, and that my mother would
be anxious about me. 'One of you had better go home with him,' said he,
turning to his sons, 'or the lad may be playing more pranks.' But Ulick
said, with a nod to his brother, 'Both of us ride home with Quin here.'

'I'm not afraid of Freny's people,' said the Captain, with a faint
attempt at a laugh; 'my man is armed, and so am I.'

'You know the use of arms very well, Quin,' said Ulick; 'and no one can
doubt your courage; but Mick and I will see you home for all that.'

'Why, you'll not be home till morning, boys. Kilwangan's a good ten mile
from here.'

'We'll sleep at Quin's quarters,' replied Ulick: 'WE'RE GOING TO STOP A
WEEK THERE.'

'Thank you,' says Quin, very faint; 'it's very kind of you.'

'You'll be lonely, you know, without us.'

'Oh yes, very lonely!' says Quin.

'And in ANOTHER WEEK, my boy,' says Ulick (and here he whispered
something in the Captain's ear, in which I thought I caught the words
'marriage,' 'parson,' and felt all my fury returning again).

'As you please,' whined out the Captain; and the horses were quickly
brought round, and the three gentlemen rode away.

Fagan stopped, and, at my uncle's injunction, walked across the old
treeless park with me. He said that after the quarrel at dinner, he
thought I would scarcely want to see the ladies that night, in which
opinion I concurred entirely; and so we went off without an adieu.

'A pretty day's work of it you have made, Master Redmond,' said
he. 'What! you a friend to the Bradys, and knowing your uncle to be
distressed for money, try and break off a match which will bring fifteen
hundred a year into the family? Quin has promised to pay off the four
thousand pounds which is bothering your uncle so. He takes a girl
without a penny--a girl with no more beauty than yonder bullock.
Well, well, don't look furious; let's say she IS handsome--there's no
accounting for tastes,--a girl that has been flinging herself at the
head of every man in these parts these ten years past, and MISSING them
all. And you, as poor as herself, a boy of fifteen--well, sixteen, if
you insist--and a boy who ought to be attached to your uncle as to your
father'--

'And so I am,' said I.

'And this is the return you make him for his kindness! Didn't he harbour
you in his house when you were an orphan, and hasn't he given you
rent-free your fine mansion of Barryville yonder? And now, when his
affairs c