igence, was commencing to dance an Irish
jig to his own music, and would have done so were it not that the
delicate state of the patient prevented him.

"Blood alive, Masther Charles!" he exclaimed, snapping his fingers in a
kind of wild triumph, "what are you lying there for? Bounce to your feet
like a two-year ould. O, holy Moses, and Melchisedek the divine, ay, and
Solomon, the son of St. Pettier, in all his glory, but that is news!"

"She told my brother Woodward, face to face, that such was her fixed
determination."

"Good again; and what did he say?"

"Nothing particular, but that he was glad it was to stay in the family,
and not go to strangers, like our uncle's--alluding, of course, to his
will in favor of dear Alice Goodwin."

"Ay, but how did he look?" asked Barney.

"I didn't observe, I was rather in pain at the time; but, from a passing
glimpse I got, I thought his countenance darkened a little; but I may be
mistaken."

"Well, I hope so," said Barney. "I hope so--but--well, I am glad to find
you are betther, Masther Charles, and to hear the good piece of
fortune you have mentioned. I trust in God your mother will keep her
word--that's all."

"As for myself," said Charles, "I am indifferent about the property; all
that presses upon my heart is my anxiety for Miss Goodwin's recovery."

"Don't be alarmed on that account," said Casey! "they say the waters
of Ballyspellan would bring the dead to life. Now, good-by, Masther
Charles; don't be cast down--keep up your spirits, for something tells
me that's there's luck before you, and good luck, too."

After leaving him Barney began to ruminate. He had remarked an
extraordinary change in the countenance and deportment of Harry
Woodward during the evening before and the earlier part of that day. The
plausible serenity of his manner was replaced by unusual gloom, and that
abstraction which is produced by deep and absorbing thought. He seemed
so completely wrapped up in constant meditation upon some particular
subject, that he absolutely forgot to guard himself against observation
or remark, by his usual artifice of manner. He walked alone in the
garden, a thing he was not accustomed to do; and during these walks he
would stop and pause, then go on slowly and musingly, and stop and pause
again. Barney, as we have said before, was a keen observer, and
having watched him from a remote corner of the garden in which he
was temporarily engaged among some flowers,