, his expedients to baffle him
were often inimitable. Those expedients did not, however, always arise
from the exigency of the moment; they were often deliberately, and with
much exertion of ingenuity, planned by the proprietors and friends
of such establishments, perhaps for weeks before the gauger's visit
occurred. But, on the other hand, as the gauger's object was to
take them, if possible, by surprise, it frequently happened that his
appearance was as unexpected as it was unwelcome. It was then that the
prompt ingenuity of the people was fully seen, felt, and understood
by the baffled exciseman, who too often had just grounds for bitterly
cursing their talent at outwitting him.

Peter served his master as a kind of superintendent in such places,
until he gained the full knowledge of distilling, according to the
processes used by the most popular adepts in the art. Having acquired
this, he set up as a professor, and had excellent business. In the
meantime, he had put together by degrees a small purse of money, to
the amount of about twenty guineas--no inconsiderable sum for a
young Irishman who intends to begin the world on his own account. He
accordingly married, and, as the influence of a wife is usually not to
be controlled during the honey-moon, Mrs. Connell prevailed on Peter
to relinquish his trade of distiller, and to embrace some other mode of
life that might not render their living so much asunder necessary. Peter
suffered himself to be prevailed upon, and promised to have nothing more
to do with private distillation, as a distiller. One of the greatest
curses attending this lawless business, is the idle and irregular habit
of life which it gradually induces. Peter could not now relish the
labor of an agriculturist, to which he had been bred, and yet he was
too prudent to sit down and draw his own and his wife's support from so
exhaustible a source as twenty guineas. Two or three days passed, during
which "he cudgelled his brains," to use his own expression, in plans for
future subsistence; two or three consultations were held with Ellish,
in which their heads were laid together, and, as it was still the
honey-moon, the subject-matter of the consultation, of course, was
completely forgotten. Before the expiration of a second month, however,
they were able to think of many other things, in addition to the
fondlings and endearments of a new-married couple. Peter was every day
becoming more his own man, and Ell