a hair of her head. No, no, plaise
God!--none of your evil doins or unlucks prophecies for her, so long,
any way, as I can presarve her from them. How black the evenin' is
gatherin', but God knows that it's the awful saison all out for the
harvest--it is that--it is that!"

Having given utterance to these sentiments, she took up the tobacco-box
which Sarah had, in such an accidental manner, tumbled out of the wall,
and surveying it for some moments, laid it hastily on the chest, and,
clasping her hands exclaimed--

"Saviour of life! it's the same! Oh, merciful God, it's thrue! it's
thrue!--the very same I seen wid him that evenin': I know it by the
broken hinge and the two letthers. The Lord forgive me my sins!--for I
see now that do what we may, or hide it as we like, God is above all!
Saviour of life, how will this end? an' what will I do?--or how am I to
act? But any way, I must hide this, and put it out of his reach."

She accordingly went out, and having ascertained that no person saw her,
thrust the box up under the thatch of the roof, in such a way that it
was impossible to suspect, by any apparent disturbance of the roof, that
it was there; after which, she sat down with sensations of dread that
were new to her, and that mingled themselves as strongly with her
affections as it was possible for a woman of a naturally firm and
undaunted character to feel them.

CHAPTER II. -- The Black Prophet Prophesies.

At a somewhat more advanced period of the same evening, two men were on
their way from the market-town of Ballynafail, towards a fertile portion
of the country, named Aughamuran, which lay in a southern direction
from it. One of them was a farmer, of middling, or rather of struggling,
circumstances, as was evident from the traces of wear and tear that were
visible upon a dress that had once been comfortable and decent, although
now it bore the marks of careful, though rather extensive repair. He
was a thin placid looking man, with something, however, of a careworn
expression in his features, unless when he smiled, and then his face
beamed with a look of kindness and goodwill that could not readily be
forgotten. The other was a strongly-built man, above the middle size,
whose complexion and features were such as no one could look on with
indifference, so strongly were they indicative of a twofold character,
or, we should rather say, calculated to make a twofold impression.
At one moment you might co