in. I was born not many miles from here"--his eye measured the
lonely landscape as if he compared it with more recent scenes--"and,
wrong or right, blood is thicker than wine. So that frankly, I am not
clear that for the sake of your Bordeaux, I'm tied to shed blood that
might be my forbears'!"

"Or your grandmother's," Augustin cried, with an open sneer.

"Or my grandmother's. Very true. But if a word to them in season----"

"Oh, d--n your words," the skipper retorted disdainfully.

He would have said more, but at that moment it became clear that
something was happening on shore. On the green brow beside the tower a
girl mounted on horseback had appeared; at a cry from her the men had
stopped work. The next moment her horse came cantering down the slope,
and with uplifted whip she rode in among the men. The whip fell twice,
and down went all the tubs within reach. Her voice, speaking, now Erse,
now Kerry English, could be heard upbraiding the nearest, commanding,
threatening, denouncing. Then on the brow behind her appeared in turn a
man--a man who looked gigantic against the sky, and who sat a horse to
match. He descended more slowly, and reached the girl's side as
O'Sullivan Og, in his frieze coat, came to the front in support of his
men.

For a full minute the girl vented her anger on Og, while he stood sulky
but patient, waiting for an opening to defend himself. When he obtained
this, he seemed to the two on the deck of the sloop to appeal to the
big man, who said a word or two, but was cut short by the girl. Her
voice, passionate and indignant, reached the deck; but not her words.

"That should be Flavia McMurrough!" the Colonel murmured thoughtfully,
"And Uncle Ulick. He's little changed, whoever's changed! She has a
will, it seems, and good impulses!"

The big man had begun by frowning on O'Sullivan Og. But presently he
smiled at something the latter said, then he laughed; at last he made a
joke himself. At that the girl turned on him; but he argued with her. A
man held up a tub for inspection, and though she struck it pettishly
with her whip, it was plain that she was shaken. O'Sullivan Og pointed
to the sloop, pointed to his house, grinned. The listeners on the deck
caught the word "Dues!" and the peal of laughter that followed.

Captain Augustin understood naught of what was going forward. But the
man beside him, who did, touched his sleeve. "It were well to speak to
her," he said.

"Who is she?" th