ing it, and he don't
speak to me himself, but to himself he do be speaking. And the old woman
says to me, 'Go down now to your landlord and see what he can do for
you;' and I said I will go, for if he was at home, there was never a
bishop or a priest or a friar spoke better and honester words to me than
his honour's self."

Martin Regan paused to take breath and wipe his mouth with his coat
sleeve, and after a moment's abstracted gaze at the vista of tall fir
trees before him, burst out again:

"And now it's whisky and tea for the old woman, and trimmings at two
shillings the yard for the sister's dress, and what for Martin? what for
the boy that worked for them the twelve months long? Me that used to go
a mile beyond Cloon every morning to break stones, and to deal for two
stone o' meal every Saturday to feed the childer when there was nothing
in the field. And it's trying to drive me from the house now they are,
and me to wet my own tea and to dress my own bed, and me after wringing
my shirt twice, with respects to ye, after working all the day in the
potato ridges."

"Could no one influence your stepmother; has she no friends here?" asked
Louise, much moved.

Martin Regan laughed bitterly.

"Sure she never belonged to the estate at all," he said, "but came in
the middle of the night on me and the little sister sitting by the
little fire of bushes, and me with a little white coat on me. And we
never knew where she came from, and never brought a penny nor a blanket
nor a stitch of clothes with her, and our own mother brought seventy
pounds and two feather beds. And now she's stiffer than a woman that
would have a hundred pounds. And now the old man's like to die, and
maybe he won't pass the night, and where'll I be? Sure if he would keep
him living a little longer he might get repentance."

"Had you not better ask the Doctor to see him?" said Louise. "He might
bring him round for a time, and then we must do our best for you."

"I was thinking that myself," said Regan; "and I believe I'd best go
look for him now; I might chance to find him at home. I heard the old
woman had the priest sent for; but, sure, he's wore out anointing
him--he threatened to die so often. But he's worse now than ever I saw
him." And taking off his hat with many expressions of gratitude, he left
Louise to finish her walk alone.

An hour or two later she returned, her hands full of sprays and berries
as an excuse for her wanderings. The