ve you, Darby," said his father; "but are you
comfortable? Draw your chair nearer the fire--the evenin's gettin'
cowld."

"I'm very well, Denis, I thank you;--nearer the fire! Faix, except you
want to have me roasted along wid that shoulder of mutton and goose, I
think I can't go much nearer it."

"I'm sorry, you wasn't in sooner, Darby, till you'd hear what Docthor
Finnerty here--God spare him long among us--said of Denis a while ago.
Docthor, if it wouldn't be makin' too free, maybe you'd oblage me wid
repatin' it over again?"

"I can never have any hesitation," replied the priest, "in repeating
anything to his advantage--I stated, Darby, that young Misther
O'Shaughnessy was a youth of whom my opinion was decidedly
_peculiar_--keep basting; child, you're forgetting the goose now; did
you never see a priest's boots before?"

"An' nobody has a better right to know nor yourself, wherever larnin'
and education's consarned," said the father.

"Why, it's not long since I examined him myself; I say it sitting here,
and I believe every one that hears me is present; and during the course
of the examination I was really astonished. The translations, and
derivations, and conjugations, and ratiocinations, and variations, and
investigations that he gave, were all the most remarkably original
I ever heard. He would not be contented with the common sense of a
passage; but he'd keep hunting, and hawking, and fishing about for
something that was out of the ordinary course of reading, that I was
truly struck with his eccentric turn of genius."

"You think he'll pass the Bishop with great credit, Docthor?"

"I'll tell you what I think, Denis--which is going further than I went
yet--I think that if he were the Bishop, and the Bishop the candidate
for Maynooth, that his lordship would have but a poor chance of passing.
There's the pinnacle of my eulogium upon him; and now, to give my
opinion on another important subject; I pronounce both the goose and
mutton done to a turn. As it appears that Mrs. O'Shaughnessy has every
other portion of the dinner ready, I move that we commence operations as
soon as possible."

"But Denis, Docthor? it would be a pleasure to me to have him, poor
fellow, wid all his throuble over, and his mind at ase; maybe if we wait
a weeshy while longer, Docthor, that he'll come, and you know Father
Molony too is to come yet, and some more of our friends."

"If the examination was a long one, I tell you that