"May be you haven't seen me often enough," said Father O'Rourke, a stout
broad-faced man, with a countenance of the ordinary low Irish type.
"How is it that Dermot there has so many books? Ah! I have heard about
his doings; he often goes up, I am told, to the Protestant minister's.
What good can he get by going there?"

"Much good, your reverence," observed Dermot; "I have been learning to
read and write, and gain other knowledge such as I had no other means of
obtaining."

"Such knowledge may be bad for one like you," said Father O'Rourke;
"there is no good can come from the place where you go to get it."

"Pardon me, Father O'Rourke," said Dermot, with spirit; "the knowledge I
get there is good, and the gentleman who gives it is kind and good too.
I will not hear him spoken against."

"What, lad! do you dare to speak to me in that way?" exclaimed the
priest. "You will be going over to the Protestants, and then the curse
of Saint Patrick and all the holy saints will rest upon you,--you too,
who are born to be a priest of the holy faith. Look; you were marked
before you came into the world with the emblem of our faith, and if your
mother had followed the wishes of her true friends, you would even now
be training for the priesthood, instead of being a poor fisher-boy, as
you now must be for ever, and nothing more." The priest as he spoke
seized Dermot's hand, and bared his arm to the shoulder. There,
curiously enough, above the elbow, was a red mark which might easily
have been defined as a cross.

The boy drew away his hand indignantly: "I tell you, Father O'Rourke, I
am as true a son of the Holy Church as ever I was. Mr Jamieson is no
bigot; he gives me instruction, but does not ask me to turn to his
faith, and yet, Father O'Rourke, I tell you, to my mind it is a pure and
holy faith, whatever you may say to the contrary."

The boy spoke boldly and proudly, as he again drew down the sleeve of
his shirt.

Many years before, when the red mark on Dermot's arm had first been seen
by the neighbours, it was suggested that it was evidently placed there
as a sign from heaven that he should become a priest, and that in all
probability he would rise to be a bishop, if not a cardinal. When,
however, Dermot grew a little older, and the idea was suggested to him,
he indignantly refused to accept the offers made him. In the first
place, nothing would induce him to leave his mother, and in the second,
he had no ambiti