nd when Judy came up that evening, and brought the childer to see his
honour, he unties the handkerchief, and--God bless him! whether it was
little or much he had, 'twas all the same with him--he gives 'em all
round guineas apiece.

'Hold up your head,' says my shister to Judy, as Sir Condy was busy
filling out a glass of punch for her eldest boy--'Hold up your head,
Judy; for who knows but we may live to see you yet at the head of the
Castle Rackrent estate?'

'Maybe so,' says she, 'but not the way you are thinking of.'

I did not rightly understand which way Judy was looking when she made
this speech till a while after.

'Why, Thady, you were telling me yesterday that Sir Condy had sold
all entirely to Jason, and where then does all them guineas in the
handkerchief come from?'

'They are the purchase-money of my lady's jointure,' says I.

Judy looks a little bit puzzled at this. 'A penny for your thoughts,
Judy,' says my shister; 'hark, sure Sir Condy is drinking her health.'

He was at the table in the room [THE ROOM--the principal room in the
house], drinking with the excise-man and the gauger, who came up to see
his honour, and we were standing over the fire in the kitchen.

'I don't much care is he drinking my health or not,' says Judy; 'and it
is not Sir Condy I'm thinking of, with all your jokes, whatever he is of
me.'

'Sure you wouldn't refuse to be my Lady Rackrent, Judy, if you had the
offer?' says I.

'But if I could do better!' says she.

'How better?' says I and my shister both at once.

'How better?' says she. 'Why, what signifies it to be my Lady Rackrent
and no castle? Sure what good is the car, and no horse to draw it?'

'And where will ye get the horse, Judy?' says I.

'Never mind that,' says she; 'maybe it is your own son Jason might find
that.'

'Jason!' says I; 'don't be trusting to him, Judy. Sir Condy, as I
have good reason to know, spoke well of you when Jason spoke very
indifferently of you, Judy.'

'No matter,' says Judy; 'it's often men speak the contrary just to what
they think of us.'

'And you the same way of them, no doubt,' answered I. 'Nay, don't he
denying it, Judy, for I think the better of ye for it, and shouldn't be
proud to call ye the daughter of a shister's son of mine, if I was to
hear ye talk ungrateful, and anyway disrespectful of his honour.'

'What disrespect,' says she, 'to say I'd rather, if it was my luck, be
the wife of another man?'

'You'll ha