"I had a peep at her through the window, Mister Charles, and, faix, she has
a great look of the family."

"Well, Mickey, I'll leave you twenty-four hours to cultivate the
acquaintance; and to a man like you the time, I know, is ample. Follow me
by the morning's coach. Till then, good-by."

Away we rattled once more, and soon left the town behind us. The wild
mountain tract which stretched on either side of the road presented one
bleak and brown surface, unrelieved by any trace of tillage or habitation;
an apparently endless succession of fern-clad hills lay on every side;
above, the gloomy sky of leaden, lowering aspect, frowned darkly; the sad
and wailing cry of the pewet or the plover was the only sound that broke
the stillness, and far as the eye could reach, a dreary waste extended.
The air, too, was cold and chilly; it was one of those days which, in our
springs, seemed to cast a retrospective glance towards the winter they have
left behind them. The prospect was no cheering one; from heaven above or
earth below there came no sight nor sound of gladness. The rich glow of the
Peninsular landscape was still fresh in my memory,--the luxurious verdure;
the olive, the citron, and the vine; the fair valleys teeming with
abundance; the mountains terraced with their vineyards; the blue
transparent sky spreading o'er all; while the very air was rife with the
cheering song of birds that peopled every grove. What a contrast was here!
We travelled on for miles, but no village nor one human face did we see.
Far in the distance a thin wreath of smoke curled upward; but it came from
no hearth; it arose from one of those field-fires by which spendthrift
husbandry cultivates the ground. It was, indeed, sad; and yet, I know not
how, it spoke more home to my heart than all the brilliant display and all
the voluptuous splendor I had witnessed in London. By degrees some traces
of wood made their appearance, and as we descended the mountain towards
Cahir, the country assumed a more cultivated and cheerful look,--patches of
corn or of meadow-land stretched on either side, and the voice of children
and the lowing of oxen mingled with the cawing of the rooks, as in dense
clouds they followed the ploughman's track. The changed features of the
prospect resembled the alternate phases of temperament of the dweller on
the soil,--the gloomy determination; the smiling carelessness; the dark
spirit of boding; the reckless jollity; the almost savag