ves higher in it by pride and
dishonesty. There's the high rogue and the low rogue--the great villain
and the little villain--musha! Polly, which do you think is worst, eh?"

"Faith, I think it's six o' one and half-a-dozen of the other with them.
Still, a body would suppose that the high rogue ought to rest contented;
but it's a hard thing they say to satisfy the cravin's of man's heart
when pride, an' love of wealth an' power, get into it."

"I'm not at all happy in my mind, Polly," observed her husband,
meditatively; "I'm not at aise--and I won't bear this state of mind much
longer. But, then, again, there's my pension; and that I'll lose if I
spake out. I sometimes think I'll go to the country some o' these days,
and see an ould friend."

"An where to, if it's a fair question?"

"Why," he replied, "maybe it's a fair-question to ask, but not so fair
to answer. Ay! I'll go to the country--I'll start in a few days--in a
few days! No, savin' to me, but I'll start to-morrow. Polly, I could
tell you something if I wished--I say I have a secret that none o' them
knows--ay, have I. Oh, God pardon me! The d----d thieves, to make me, me
above all men, do the blackest part of the business--an' to think o' the
way they misled Edward, too--who, after all, would be desavin' poor Lady
Gourlay, if he had tould her all as he thought, although he did not know
that he would be misleadin' her. Yes, faith, I'll start for the country
tomorrow, plaise God; but listen, Polly, do you know who's in town?"

"Arra, no!--how could I?"

"Kate M'Bride, so Ginty tells me; she's livin' with her."

"And why didn't she call to see you?" asked his wife. "And yet God knows
it's no great loss; but if ever woman was cursed wid a step-daughter, I
was wid her."

"Don't you know very well that we never spoke since her runaway match
with M'Bride. If she had married Cummins, I'd a' given her a purty penny
to help him on; but instead o' that she cuts off with a sojer, bekaise
he was well faced, and starts with him to the Aist Indies. No; I
wouldn't spake to her then, and I'm not sure I'll spake to her now
either; and yet I'd like to see her--the unfortunate woman. However,
I'll think of it; but in the mane time, as I said, I'll start for the
country in the mornin'."

And to the country he did start the next morning; and if, kind reader,
it so happen that you feel your curiosity in any degree excited, all you
have to do is to take a seat in your own i