ch they considered
a tax on their industry; that which they looked upon as an hereditary
oppression; that hateful thing, they were told, was to be extinct, and,
in joyous anticipation of the blessing, they determined to enact an
emblematic interment of this terrible enemy.--I think it is not too
much to call this idea a fine one; and yet, in the execution of it,
they invested it with the broadest marking of the grotesque. Such is
the strange compound of an Irish peasant, whose anger is often vented
in a jest, and whose mirth is sometimes terrible.

I must here pause for a moment, and request it to be distinctly
understood, that, in relating this story, in giving the facts connected
with it, and in stating what the Irish peasant's feelings are
respecting tithe, I have not the most distant notion of putting forward
any opinions of my own on the subject. In the pursuit of my own quiet
art, I am happily far removed from the fierce encounter of politics,
and I do not wish to offend against the feelings or opinions of any one
in my little volume; and I trust, therefore, that I may be permitted to
give a sketch of a characteristic incident, as it came to my knowledge,
without being mistaken for a partisan.

"I tell the tale as 'twas told to me."

I have said a group of seniors was collected at one end of the room,
and, as it is meet to give precedence to age, I will endeavour to give
some idea of what was going forward amongst them.

There was one old man of the party whose furrowed forehead, compressed
eyebrows, piqued nose, and mouth depressed at the corners, at once
indicated to a physiognomist a querulous temper. He was one of your
doubters upon all occasions, one of the unfailing elements of an
argument;--as he said himself, he was "dubersome" about everything, and
he had hence earned the name of Daddy Dubersome amongst his neighbours.
Well, Daddy began to doubt the probability that any such boon as the
extinction of tithes was to take place, and said, he was "sartin sure
'twas too good news to be thrue."

"Tare anounty," said another, who was the very antithesis of Daddy in
his credulous nature, "sure, didn't I see it myself in prent."

"I was towld often that things was in prent," returned Daddy, drily,
"that come out lies afther, to my own knowledge."

"But sure," added a third, "sure, didn't the Prime Ear himself lay it
all out before the Parley mint?"

"What Prime Ear are you talking about, man dear?"