pursue the conversation that followed. Let us, therefore,
transfer our story to the succeeding morning, when Barny O'Reirdon
strolled forth from his cottage, rather later than usual, with his eyes
bearing _eye_ witness to the carouse of the preceding night. He had not
a headache, however; whether it was that Barny was too experienced a
campaigner under the banners of Bacchus, or that Mrs. Quigley's boast
was a just one, namely, "that of all the drink in her house, there
wasn't a headache in a hogshead of it," is hard to determine, but I
rather incline to the strength of Barny's head.

Barny sauntered about in the sun, at which he often looked up, under the
shelter of compressed bushy brows and long-lashed eyelids, and a
shadowing hand across his forehead, to see "what o' day" it was; and,
from the frequency of this action, it was evident the day was hanging
heavily with Barny. He retired at last to a sunny nook in a neighboring
field, and stretching himself at full length, basked in the sun, and
began "to chew the cud of sweet and bitter thought." He first reflected
on his own undoubted weight in his little community, but still he could
not get over the annoyance of the preceding night, arising from his
being silenced by O'Sullivan; "a chap," as he said himself, "that lift
the place four years agon a brat iv a boy, and to think iv his comin'
back and outdoin' his elders, that saw him runnin' about the place, a
gassoon, that one could tache a few months before"; 'twas too bad. Barny
saw his reputation was in a ticklish position, and began to consider how
his disgrace could be retrieved. The very name of Fingal was hateful to
him; it was a plague-spot on his peace that festered there incurably. He
first thought of leaving Kinsale altogether; but flight implied so much
of defeat, that he did not long indulge in that notion. No; he _would_
stay, "in spite of all the O'Sullivans, kith and kin, breed, seed, and
generation." But at the same time he knew he should never hear the end
of that hateful place, Fingal; and if Barny had had the power, he would
have enacted a penal statute, making it death to name the accursed spot,
wherever it was; but not being gifted with such legislative authority,
he felt Kinsale was no place for him, if he would not submit to be
flouted every hour out of the four-and-twenty, by man, woman, and child,
that wished to annoy him. What was to be done? He was in the perplexing
situation, to use his own