ant women. I found too that my brother
stood high in his good graces by virtue of simply having taken the
whole work and affairs of the postal district on his own shoulders.
The rejected of St. Martin's-le-Grand was already a very valuable and
capable officer.

My brother gave me the choice of a run to the Killeries, or to
Killarney. We could not manage both. I chose the former, and a most
enjoyable trip we had. He could not leave his work to go with me, but
was to join me subsequently, I forget where, in the west. Meantime
he gave me a letter to a bachelor friend of his at Clifden. This
gentleman immediately asked me to dinner, and he and I dined
_tete-a-tete._ Nevertheless, he thought it necessary to apologise for
the appearance of a very fine John Dory on the table, saying, that he
had been himself to the market to get a turbot for me, but that he had
been asked half-a-crown for a not very large one, and really he could
not give such absurd prices as that!

Anthony duly joined me as proposed, and we had a grand walk over
the mountains above the Killeries. I don't forget and never shall
forget--nor did Anthony ever forget; alas! that we shall never more
talk over that day again--the truly grand spectacular changes from
dark thick enveloping cloud to brilliant sunshine, suddenly revealing
all the mountains and the wonderful colouring of the intertwining
sea beneath them, and then back to cloud and mist and drifting sleet
again. It was a glorious walk. We returned wet to the skin to "Joyce's
Inn," and dined on roast goose and whisky punch, wrapped in our
blankets like Roman senators!

One other scene I must recall. The reader will hardly believe that it
occurred in Ireland. There was an election of a member for I forget
what county or borough, and my brother and I went to the hustings--the
only time I ever was at an election in Her Majesty's dominions. What
were the party feelings, or the party colours, I utterly forget. It
was merely for the fun of the thing that we went there. The fun indeed
was fast and furious. The whole scene on the hustings, as well
as around them, seemed to me one seething mass of senseless but
good-humoured hustling and confusion. Suddenly in the midst of the
uproar an ominous cracking was heard, and in the next minute the
hustings swayed and came down with a crash, heaping together in a
confused mass all the two or three hundreds of human beings who were
on the huge platform. Some few were