ition one might safely ask for and reasonably expect?'

'That's not long to look for. Let them support you in the county. Telegraph
back, "I'm going to stand, and, if I get in, will be a Whig whenever I am
not a Nationalist. Will the party stand by me?"'

'Scarcely with that programme.'

'And do you think that the priests' nominees, who are three-fourths of the
Irish members, offer better terms? Do you imagine that the men that crowd
the Whig lobby have not reserved their freedom of action about the Pope,
and the Fenian prisoners, and the Orange processionists? If they were not
free so far, I'd ask you with the old Duke, How is Her Majesty's Government
to be carried on?'

Kearney shook his head in dissent.

'And that's not all,' continued the other; 'but you must write to the
papers a flat contradiction of that shooting story. You must either declare
that it never occurred at all, or was done by that young scamp from the
Castle, who happily got as much as he gave.'

'That I could not do,' said Kearney firmly.

'And it is that precisely that you must do,' rejoined the other. 'If you go
into the House to represent the popular feeling of Irishmen, the hand that
signs the roll must not be stained with Irish blood.'

'You forget; I was not within fifty miles of the place.'

'And another reason to disavow it. Look here, Mr. Kearney: if a man in a
battle was to say to himself, I'll never give any but a fair blow, he'd
make a mighty bad soldier. Now, public life is a battle, and worse than a
battle in all that touches treachery and falsehood. If you mean to do any
good in the world, to yourself and your country, take my word for it,
you'll have to do plenty of things that you don't like, and, what's worse,
can't defend.'

'The soup is getting cold all this time. Shall we sit down?'

'No, not till we answer the telegram. Sit down and say what I told you.'

'Atlee will say I'm mad. He knows that I have not a shilling in the world.'

'Riches is not the badge of the representation,' said the other.

'They can at least pay the cost of the elections.'

'Well, we'll pay ours too--not all at once, but later on; don't fret
yourself about that.'

'They'll refuse me flatly.'

'No, we have a lien on the fine gentleman with the broken arm. What would
the Tories give for that story, told as I could tell it to them? At all
events, whatever you do in life, remember this--that if asked your price
for anything you have done, n