n I was a child. God be good to
us.--There was ould Miles O'Donoghue, the present man's father, I'd like
to see what he'd say, if they talked to him about improvement. Ayeh!
sure I mind the time a hogshead of claret didn't do the fortnight. My
father, rest his soul, used to go up to the house every Monday morning
for orders; and ye'd see a string of cars following him at the same
time, with tay, and sugar, and wine, and brandy, and oranges, and
lemons. Them was the raal improvements!"

"'Tis true for ye, ma'am. It was a fine house, I always heerd tell."

"Forty-six in the kitchen, besides about fourteen colleens and gossoons
about the place; the best of enthertainment up stairs and down."

"Musha! that was grand."

"A keg of sperits, with a spigot, in the servants' hall, and no saying
by your leave, but drink while ye could stand over it."

"The Lord be good to us!" piously ejaculated the twain.

"The hams was boiled in sherry wine."

"Begorra, I wish I was a pig them times."

"And a pike daren't come up to table without an elegant pudding in his
belly that cost five pounds!"

"'Tis the fish has their own luck always," was the profound meditation
at this piece of good fortune.

"Ayeh! ayeh!" continued the hostess in a strain of lamentation, "When
the ould stock was in it, we never heerd tell of improvements. He'll be
making me take out a license, I suppose," said she, in a voice of half
contemptuous incredulity.

"Faix, there's no knowing," said Joe, as he shook the ashes out of his
pipe, and nodded his head sententiously, as though to say, that in the
miserable times they'd fallen upon, any thing was possible.

"Licensed for sperits and groceries," said Mrs. M'Kelly, with a sort of
hysterical giggle, as if the thought were too much for her nerves.

"I wouldn't wonder if he put up a pike," stammered out Jim, thereby
implying that human atrocity would have reached its climax.

The silence which followed this terrible suggestion, was now loudly
interrupted by a smart knocking at the door of the cabin, which was
already barred and locked for the night.

"Who's there?" said Mary, as she held a cloak across the blaze of the
fire, so as to prevent the light being seen through the apertures of the
door--"'tis in bed we are, and late enough, too."

"Open the door, Mary, it's me," said a somewhat confident voice. "I saw
the fire burning brightly--and there's no use hiding it."

"Oh, troth, Mr. Mark, I'll not