too. Will you ordher one o' thim to show
me his bed, ma'am, if you plase," continued Peter, "while he's an me?
It'll save throuble."

"Connell is right," observed his landlord. "Gallagher, show him John's
bed-room."

Peter accordingly followed another servant, who pointed out his bed, and
assisted to place the vanquished footman in a somewhat easier position
than that in which Peter had carried him.

"Connell," said his landlord, when he returned, "how did this happen?"

"Faith, thin, it's a burnin' shame," said Connell, "to be able only to
bear"--

"But how did it happen? for he has been hitherto a perfectly sober man."

"Faix, plase your honor, asy enough," replied Peter; "he began to
lecthur me about! dhrinkin' so, says I, 'Come an' sit down behind the
hedge here, an' we'll talk it over between us;' so we went in, the two
of us, a-back o' the ditch--an' he began to advise me agin dhrink, an'
I began to tell him about her that's gone, sir. Well, well! och, och!
no matther!--So, sir, one story an' one pull from the bottle, brought
on another, for divil a glass we had at all, sir. Faix, he's a
tindher-hearted boy, anyhow; for as myself I begun to let the tears
down, whin the bottle was near out, divil resave the morsel of him but
cried afther poor Ellish, as if she had been his mother. Faix, he did!
An' it won't be the last sup we'll have together, plase goodness! But
the best of it was, sir, that the dhrunker he got, he abused me the more
for dhrinkin'. Oh, thin, but he's the pious boy whin he gets a sup
in his head! Faix, it's a pity ever he'd be sober, he talks so much
scripthur an' devotion in his liquor!"

"Connell," said the landlord, "I am exceedingly sorry to hear that you
have taken so openly and inveterately to drink as you have done,
ever since the death of your admirable wife. This, in fact, was what
occasioned me to send for you. Come into the parlor. Don't go, my dear;
perhaps your influence may also be necessary. Gallagher, look to Smith,
and see that every attention is paid him, until he recovers the effects
of his intoxication."

He then entered the parlor, where the following dialogue took place
between him and Peter:--

"Connell, I am really grieved to hear that you have become latterly so
incorrigible a drinker; I sent for you to-day, with the hope of being
able to induce you to give it up."

"Faix, your honor, it's jist what I'd expect from your father's
son--kindness, an' dacency, an'