well as he could. But at the age of fifteen the
youth left the village, that had so many wretched memories of hardship
and struggle, and worked his way to Dublin. It was many years before
Father Cahill heard of him again. He had developed meanwhile into one
of the most daring of all the fervid speakers in the sacred Cause of
Liberty. Many were the stories told of his narrow escapes from death
and imprisonment. He always had the people on his side, and once away
from the hunt, he would hide in caves, or in mountains, until the hue
and cry was over, and then appear in some totally unexpected town and
call on the people to act in the name of Freedom.

And that was exactly what happened on this particular day. He had
suddenly appeared in the town he was born in and called a meeting on
St. Kernan's Hill that afternoon.

It was this meeting Father Cahill was determined to stop by every means
in his power.

He could hardly believe that this tall, bronzed, powerful young man was
the Frank O'Connell he had watched about the village, as a boy--pale,
dejected, and with but little of the fire of life in him. Now as he
stood before Father Cahill and looked him straight through with his
piercing eye, shoulders thrown back, and head held high, he looked
every inch a born leader of men, and just for a moment the priest
quailed. But only for a moment.

"Not a member of my flock will attend yer meetin' to-day. Not a door
will open this day. Ye can face the constabulary yerself and the few of
the rabble that'll follow ye. But none of my God-fearin' people will
risk their lives and their liberty to listen to you."

O'Connell looked at him strangely. A far-away glint came into his eye,
and the suspicion of a tear, as he answered:

"Sure it's precious little they'd be riskin', Father Cahill; havin' NO
liberty and their lives bein' of little account to them."

O'Connell sighed as the thought of his fifteen years of withered youth
in that poor little village came up before him.

"Let my people alone, I tell ye!" cried the priest. "It's contented
they've been until the likes of you came amongst us."

"Then they must have been easily satisfied," retorted O'Connell, "to
judge by their poor little homes and their drab little lives."

"A hovel may be a palace if the Divine Word is in it," said the priest.

"Sure it's that kind of tachin' keeps Ireland the mockery of the whole
world. The Divine Word should bring Light. It's only darkness