to state, that the moment M'Carthy, who
was now present, heard the jolly pedlar's voice, he started, and felt
considerably surprise. The tones of it were neither familiar to him nor
yet were they strange. That he had heard them somewhere, and on some
occasion, he could almost have sworn. Occasionally a turn of the man's
voice would strike him as not being new to him, but again, for the next
minute or two, it was such as he could not remember to have ever heard.
This we say by way of parenthesis.

"For the gentlemen! Lord help you, Mr. Purcel, I never think of them
when the ladies is before me--who would! However, I'm well prepared even
for them. Here is a case o' razors that 'ud cut half an inch before the
edge; now, if you find me another pair that'll do the seem--hem!
the same--I'll buy the Bank of Ireland and give it to you for a
new-year's-gift."

"Don't you know this gentleman?" asked the proctor, pointing to
M'Carthy.

"Let me see," said he--"we'll now--eh, no--I think not, he is neither
so well made, nor by any manes so well lookin' as the other;" and the
pedlar, as he spoke, fixed his eyes, but without seeming to gaze, upon
Julia, who, on hearing a comparison evidently so disadvantageous to
M'Carthy, blushed deeply, and passed to another part of the room, in
order to conceal what she felt must have been visible, and might have
excited observation.

"No," proceeded the pedlar; "I thought at first he was one of the
left-legge'd M'Squiggins's, as they call them, from Fumblestown--but
he is not, I know, for the raisons I said. They're a very good plain
family, the M'Squiggins's, only that nobody's likely to fall in love
wid them--upon my profits, I'm half inclined to think he's one of them
still--eh, let me see again--would you turn round a little, if you
plaise, sir, till I thry if the cast's in your eye. Upon my faith, there
it is sure enough! How are you, Misther M'Squiggins? I'm happy to see
you well, sir. How is your sisther, Miss Pugshey, an' all the family,
sir?--all well, I hope, sir?"

"All well," replied M'Carthy, laughing as loud as any of the rest, every
one of whom actually in convulsions--for they knew, with the exception
of Julia, who was deceived at first by the pedlar's apparent gravity,
that he was only bantering her lover.

The proctor, who, although a man that loved money as his God--with his
whole heart, soul, and strength--was yet exceedingly anxious to stand
well with the world, and on