did to Bridget Doran. No one knew the plan she had laid for Phelim,
but this fool, and, in order to secure his silence, she had promised him
a shirt on the Monday after the first call. Now Art, as was evident
by his endless habit of shrugging, felt the necessity of a shirt very
strongly.

About ton o'clock on Monday he presented himself to Sally, and claimed
his recompense.

"Art," said Sally, "the shirt I intended for you is upon Squire Nugent's
hedge beside their garden. You know the family's goin' up to Dublin on
Thursday, Art, an' they're gettin' their washin' done in time to be off.
Go down, but don't let any one see you; take the third shirt on the row,
an' bring it up to me till I smooth it for you."

Art sallied down to the hedge on which the linen had been put out to
dry, and having reconnoitered the premises, shrugged himself, and cast a
longing eye on the third shirt. With that knavish penetration, however,
peculiar to such persons, he began to reflect that Sally might have
some other object in view besides his accommodation. He determined,
therefore, to proceed upon new principles--sufficiently safe, he
thought, to protect him from the consequences of theft. "Good-morrow,
Bush," said Art, addressing that on which the third shirt was spread.
"Isn't it a burnin' shame an' a sin for you," he continued, "to have
sich a line white shirt an you, an' me widout a stitch to my back. Will
you swap?"

Having waited until the bush had due time to reply.

"Sorra fairer," he observed; "silence gives consint."

In less than two minutes he stripped, put on one of the Squire's best
shirts, and spread out his own dusky fragment in its place.

"It's a good thing," said Art, "to have a clear conscience; a fair
exchange is no robbery."

Now, it so happened that the Squire himself, who was a humorist, and
also a justice of the peace, saw Art putting his morality in practice at
the hedge. He immediately walked out with an intention of playing off
a trick upon the fool for his dishonesty; and he felt the greater
inclination to do this in consequence of an opinion long current, that
Art, though he had outwitted several, had never been outwitted himself.

Art had been always a welcome guest in the Squire's kitchen, and never
passed the "Big House," as an Irish country gentleman's residence is
termed, without calling. On this occasion, however, he was too cunning
to go near it--a fact which the Squire observed. By taking a