y my business has been
so unpleasant. Your mother, Martin, had betther not disregard that
notice. Good morning, Miss Lynch: good morning, Mrs Kelly; good
morning, Martin;" and Daly took up his hat, and left the room.

"Good morning to you, Mr Daly," said Martin: "as I've said before, I'm
sorry to see you've taken to this line of business."

As soon as the attorney was gone, both Martin and his mother attempted
to console and re-assure poor Anty, but they did not find the task an
easy one. "Oh, Mrs Kelly," she said, as soon as she was able to say
anything, "I'm sorry I iver come here, I am: I'm sorry I iver set my
foot in the house!"

"Don't say so, Anty, dear," said the widow. "What'd you be sorry
for--an't it the best place for you?"

"Oh! but to think that I'd bring all these throubles on you! Betther
be up there, and bear it all, than bring you and yours into law, and
sorrow, and expense. Only I couldn't find the words in my throat to
say it, I'd 've tould the man that I'd 've gone back at once. I wish
I had--indeed, Mrs Kelly, I wish I had."

"Why, Anty," said Martin, "you an't fool enough to believe what Daly's
been saying? Shure all he's afther is to frighthen you out of this.
Never fear: Barry can't hurt us a halfporth, though no doubt he's
willing enough, av' he had the way."

"I wish I was in a convent, this moment," said Anty. "Oh! I wish I'd
done as father asked me long since. Av' the walls of a convent was
around me, I'd niver know what throubles was."

"No more you shan't now," said Martin: "Who's to hurt you? Come, Anty,
look up; there's nothing in all this to vex you."

But neither son nor mother were able to soothe the poor young woman.
The very presence of an attorney was awful to her; and all the jargon
which Daly had used, of juries, judges, trials, and notices, had
sounded terribly in her ears. The very names of such things were to
her terrible realities, and she couldn't bring herself to believe that
her brother would threaten to make use of such horrible engines of
persecution, without having the power to bring them into action. Then,
visions of the lunatic asylum, into which he had declared that he would
throw her, flitted across her, and made her whole body shiver and
shake; and again she remembered the horrid glare of his eye, the hot
breath, and the frightful form of his visage, on the night when he
almost told her that he would murder her.

Poor Anty had at no time high or enduring