ye this bout.--Come, in the name of God, let us go, and see-everything
rightified at once--hut, tut--come."

Many similar details of Owen M'Carthy's useful life could be given, in
which he bore an equally benevolent and Christian part. Poor fellow! he
was, ere long, brought low; but, to the credit of our peasantry, much
as is said about their barbarity, he was treated, when helpless, with
gratitude, pity, and kindness.

Until the peace of 1814, Owen's regular and systematic industry
enabled him to struggle successfully against a weighty rent and sudden
depression in the price of agricultural produce; that is, he was able,
by the unremitting toil of a man remarkable alike for an unbending
spirit and a vigorous frame of body, to pay his rent with tolerable
regularity. It is true, a change began to be visible in his personal
appearance, in his farm, in the dress of his children, and in the
economy of his household. Improvements, which adequate capital would
have enabled, him to effect, were left either altogether unattempted,
or in an imperfect state, resembling neglect, though, in reality, the
result of poverty. His dress at mass, and in fairs and markets, had,
by degrees, lost that air of comfort and warmth which bespeak the
independent farmer. The evidences of embarrassment began to disclose
themselves in many small points--inconsiderable, it is true, but not
the less significant. His house, in the progress of his declining
circumstances,ceased to be annually ornamented by a new coat of
whitewash; it soon assumed a faded and yellowish hue, and sparkled not
in the setting sun as in the days of Owen's prosperity. It had, in fact,
a wasted, unthriving look, like its master. The thatch became black
and rotten upon its roof; the chimneys sloped to opposite points; the
windows were less neat, and ultimately, when broken, were patched with a
couple of leaves from the children's blotted copy-books. His out-houses
also began to fail. The neatness of his little farm-yard, and the
cleanliness which marked so conspicuously the space fronting his
dwelling-house, disappeared in the course of time. Filth began to
accumulate where no filth had been; his garden was not now planted so
early, nor with such taste and neatness as before; his crops were later,
and less abundant; his haggarts neither so full nor so trim as they were
wont to be, nor his ditches and enclosures kept in such good repair. His
cars, ploughs, and other farming im