g him. One of them was certainly
fulfilled to the letter--we mean that in which it was stated, "that the
greatest swaggerer among the girls generally comes to the wall at last."
The other, though not literally accomplished, was touched at least upon
the spirit; transportation for life ranks next to hanging. We,cannot
avoid mentioning a fact connected with Phelim which came to light while
he remained in prison. By incessant trouble he was prevailed upon, or
rather compelled, to attend the prison school, and on examining him,
touching his religion? knowledge, it appeared that he was ignorant of
the plainest truths of Christianity; that he knew not how or by whom the
Christian religion had been promulgated; nor, indeed, any other moral
truth connected with Revelation.

Immediately after his transportation, Larry took to drink, and his
mother to begging, for she had no other means of living. In this mode
of life, the husband was soon compelled to join her. They are both
mendicants, and Sheelah now appears sensible of the error in their
manner of bringing Phelim up.

"Ah! Larry," she is sometimes heard to say, "I doubt that we wor wrong
for flyin' in the face o' God, becase He didn't give us childhre. An'
when it plased Him to grant us a son, we oughtn't to 've spoiled him by
over-indulgence, an' by lettin' him have his own head in everythin'
as we did. If we had sint him to school, an' larned him to work, an'
corrected him when he desarved it, instead of laughin' at his lies, an'
misbehavior, and his oaths, as if they wor sport--ay, an abusin' the
nabors when they'd complain of him, or tell us what he was--ay!--if we
had, it's a credit an' a comfort he'd be to us now, an' not a shame an'
a disgrace, an' an affliction. We made our own bed, Larry, an' now we
must lie down an it. An' God help us! We made his bed too, poor boy, an'
a hard one it is. God forgive us! but, anyhow, my heart a breakin', for
bad as he was, sure we havn't him to look upon!"

"Thrue," replied Larry. "Still he was game an' cute to the last. Biddy
Doran's ten guineas will sarve him beyant, poor fellow. But sure the
boys' kep their word to him, anyhow, in regard of shootin' Foodie
Flattery. Myself was never betther plased in my life, than to hear that
he got the slugs into his heart, the villain!"

*****

We have attempted to draw Phelim O'Toole as closely as possible to the
character of that class, whose ignorance, want of education and absence
of