ails you, Sister Erin, that your face
Is, like your mountains, still bedewed with tears?
. . . . . . .
Forgive! forget! lest harsher lips should say,
Like your turf fire, your rancour smoulders long,
And let Oblivion strew Time's ashes o'er your wrong.'
Alfred Austin.

At tea-time, and again after our simple dinner--for Bridget Thunder's
repertory is not large, and Benella's is quite unsuited to the Knockcool
markets--we wend our way to a certain house that stands by itself on
the road to Lisdara. It is only a whitewashed cabin with green window
trimmings, but it is a larger and more comfortable one than we commonly
see, and it is the perfection of neatness within and without. The stone
wall that encloses it is whitewashed too, and the iron picket railing at
the top is painted bright green; the stones on the posts are green also,
and there is the prettiest possible garden, with nicely cut borders of
box. In fine, if ever there was a cheery place to look at, Sarsfield
Cottage is that one; and if ever there was a cheerless gentleman, it is
Mr. Jordan, who dwells there. Mrs. Wogan Odevaine commended him to us
as the man of all others with whom to discuss Irish questions, if we
wanted, for once in a way, to hear a thoroughly disaffected, outraged,
wrong-headed, and rancorous view of things.

"He is an encyclopaedia, and he is perfectly delightful on any topic in
the universe but the wrongs of Ireland," said she; "not entirely sane
and yet a good father, and a good neighbour, and a good talker. Faith,
he can abuse the English government with any man alive! He has a smaller
grudge against you Americans, perhaps, than against most of the other
nations, so possibly he may elect to discuss something more cheerful
than our national grievances; if he does, and you want a livelier topic,
just mention--let me see--you might speak of Wentworth, who destroyed
Ireland's woollen industry, though it is true he laid the foundation
of the linen trade, so he wouldn't do, though Mr. Jordan is likely to
remember the former point and forget the latter. Well, just breathe the
words 'Catholic Disqualification' or 'Ulster Confiscation,' and you will
have as pretty a burst of oratory as you'd care to hear. You remember
that exasperated Englishman who asked in the House why Irishmen were
always laying bare their grievances. And Major O'Gorman bawled across