orance,
and throw ridicule upon it, neither seeking to convey sound notions, nor
combat erroneous impressions."

"Captain Travers was but too easy a mark for such weapons," said
Kate, angrily, "It was his pleasure to make Ireland the object of his
sarcasm."

"So Hemsworth contrived it!" cried Herbert, eagerly, for it was a
subject of which he had long been anxious to speak, and one he had
heard much of from Sybella. "I know well the game he played, and how
successfully too."

Kate blushed deeply; for a moment she believed that her own secret was
known to Herbert, but the next instant she was reassured that all was
safe.

"Sybella told me how he actually lay in wait for opportunities to entice
Frederick into discussion before you, well knowing the themes that
would irritate him, and calculating how far petty refutations, and
half-suppressed sneers would embarrass and annoy him--the more,
because Frederick saw how much more favourably you regarded Hemsworth's
sentiments than his own; and, indeed, sometimes I fancied, Kate, it was
a point the Guardsman was very tender about;--nay, sweet cousin, I would
not say a word to offend you."

"Then, do not speak of this again, Herbert," said she, in a low voice.

"It is a luckless land," said Herbert, sighing. "They who know it well
are satisfied with the cheap patriotism of declaiming on its wrongs.
They who feel most acutely for its sorrows, are, for the most part,
too ignorant to alleviate them. I begin to think my uncle is quite
right--that the best thing we could do would be to make a truce--to draw
the game--for some twenty or thirty years, and try if the new generation
might not prove wiser in expedients than their fathers."

"A luckless land, indeed!" said Mark, who, coming up at the moment, had
overheard the last words. "You were right to call it so--where the son
of an O'Donoghue sees no more glorious path to follow than that of a
hollow compromise!"

Kate and Herbert started as he spoke, and while her face flashed with an
emotion of mingled pride and shame, Herbert looked abashed, and almost
angry at the reproach.

"Forgive me, Herbert," said Mark, in a voice of deep melancholy. "Not
even this theme should sow a difference between us. I came to bid you
good-bye."

"Good-bye, Mark?" cried Kate, starting with terrified surprise.

"Going to leave us, Mark!" exclaimed Herbert, in an accent of true
sorrow.

"It is but for a few days--at least I hope that it w