al two will enjoy the luxury of a mutual
battle, by way of episode, and again proceed on their way, kissing and
hugging as if nothing had happened to interrupt their friendship. All
the usual effects of jollity and violence, fun and fighting, love and
liquor, were, of course, to be seen, felt, heard, and understood on this
day, in a manner much more remarkable than on common occasions; for it
maybe observed, that the national festivals of the Irish bring-out their
strongest points of character with peculiar distinctness.

The family of Frank M'Kenna were sitting down to their Christmas dinner;
the good man had besought a blessing upon the comfortable and abundant
fare of which they were about to partake, and nothing was amiss, save
the absence of their younger son.

"Musha, where on earth can this boy be stayin'?" said the father: "I'm
sure this, above all days in the year, is one he oughtn't to be from home
an."

The mother was about to inform him of the son's having gone to
the mountains, when the latter returned, breathless, pale, and
horror-struck.

Rody eyed him keenly, and laid down the bit he was conveying to his
mouth.

"Heavens above us!" exclaimed his mother, "what ails you?"

He only replied by dashing his hat upon the ground, and exclaiming, "Up
wid yez!--up wid yez!--quit your dinners! Oh, Rody! what'll be done?
Go down to Owen Reillaghan's--go 'way--go down--an' tell thim--Oh,
vick-na-hoie! but this was the unfortunate day to us all? Mike
reillaghan is shot with my gun; she went off in his hand goin' over a
snow wreath, an' he's lyin' dead in the mountains?"

The screams and the wailing which immediately rose in the family were
dreadful. Mrs. M'Kenna almost fainted; and the father, after many
struggles to maintain his firmness, burst into the bitter tears of
disconsolation and affliction. Rody was calmer, but turned his eyes
from one to another with a look of deep compassion, and again eyed Frank
keenly and suspiciously.

Frank's eye caught his, and the glance which had surveyed him with such
a scrutiny did not escape his observation. "Rody," said he, "do you go
an' brake it to the, Reillaghans: you're the best to do it; for, when we
were settin' out, you saw that he-carried the gun, an' not me."

"Thrue for you," said Rody; "I saw that, Frank, and can swear to it; but
that's all I did see. I know nothing of what happened in the mountains."

"Damnho sheery orth! (* Eternal perdition on you!) Wh