this, the girl promised herself, should more truly and more fitly be
styled "the great day of Ireland." On this day would they begin a work
the end of which no man could see, but which, to the close of time,
should shed a lustre on the name of McMurrough. No more should their
native land be swept along, a chained slave, a handmaid, in the train
of a more brutal, a more violent, and a more stupid people! From this
day Ireland's valour, that had never known fit leading, should be
recognised for what it was, her wit be turned to good uses, her old
traditions be revived in the light of new glories. The tears rose to
the girl's eyes, her bosom heaved, her heart seemed too large for her,
as she pictured the fruition of the work to be begun this day, and with
clasped hands and prayerful eyes sang her morning hymn.

No more should an Irish gentleman walk swordless and shamed among his
equals. No more should the gallant beast he had bred be seized with
contumely in the market-place. No more should all the nobler services
of his native land be closed to him, his faith be banned, his priests
proscribed! No more should he be driven to sell his valour to the
highest bidder, and pour forth his blood in foreign causes, under the
walls of old Vienna, and on every stricken field from Almanza to the
Don. For on this day Ireland should rouse herself from the long
nightmare, the oppression of centuries. She should remember her
greatness of old time and the blessing of Patrick; and those who had
enslaved her, those who had scorned her and flouted her, should learn
the strength of hands nerved by the love of God and the love of
country! This day at Morristown the day should break.

The tears gushed from her eyes as she thought of this, and with an
overflowing heart thanked Heaven for the grace and favour that assigned
her a part in the work. And the halo formed of those tears ennobled all
she saw about her. The men, still sprawling up and down the courtyard
in the abandonment of drink, her brother calling with a pale face and
querulous oaths for a cooling draught, Sir Donny and old Tim Burke,
yawning off, like the old topers they were, the effects of the
carouse--the cause and her hopes ennobled all. It was much--may she be
forgiven!--if, in the first enthusiasm of the morning, she gave a
single thought to the misguided kinsman whose opposition had hurried
him into trouble, and exposed him to dangers at which she vaguely
guessed.

Fool