rm of Land Act that would most benefit Ireland.

It was proposed that he should lecture right through the country,
wherever they would let him, and awaken amongst the more violent Irish,
the recognition that legislative means were surer of securing the end
in view, than the more violent ones of fifteen years before.

The brutality of the Coercion Act had been moderated and already the
agricultural and dairy produce of the country had developed so
remarkably that the terrible misery of by-gone days, when the
potato-crop would fail, had been practically eliminated, or at least in
many districts mitigated.

O'Connell accepted the proposition.

Through the country he went speaking in every village he passed
through, and sometimes giving several lectures in the big cities. His
mode of travelling was in a cart. He would speak from the back of it,
Peg sitting at his feet, now watching him, again looking eagerly and
intently at the strange faces before her.

They were marvellous days, travelling, sometimes, under a golden sun
through the glistening fields: or pushing on at night under a great
green-and-white moon. Peg would sit beside her father as he drove and
he would tell her little folk-stories, or sing wild snatches of songs
of the days of the Rebellion; or quote lines ringing with the great
Irish confidence in the triumph of Justice:

"Lo the path we tread
By our martyred dead
Has been trodden 'mid bane and blessing,
But unconquered still
Is the steadfast will
And the faith they died confessing."

Or at night he would croon from Moore:

"When the drowsy world is dreaming, love,
Then awake--the heavens look bright, my dear,
'Tis never too late for delight, my dear,
And the best of all ways
To lengthen our days
Is to steal a few hours from the night, my dear!"

When storms would come she would cower down in the bottom of the cart
and cry and pray. Storms terrified her. It seemed as if all the anger
of the heavens were levelled at her. She would cry and moan pitifully
whilst O'Connell would try to soothe her and tell her that neither God
nor man would harm her--no one would touch his "Peg o' my Heart."

After one of those scenes he would sit and brood. Angela had always
been afraid of storms, and in the child's terror his beloved wife would
rise up before him and the big tears would drop silently down his
cheeks.

Pe