oved; he saw her a happy wife and mother in her own
home, kind and benevolent to all who required her good word or her good
office, and remembered the sweetness of her light-hearted song; but now
she was homeless. He remembered, too, how she used to plead with himself
for the afflicted. It was but a moment; yet when their eyes met, that
moment was crowded by recollections that flashed across their minds with
a keen, sense of a lot so bitter and wretched as theirs. Kathleen could
not speak, although she tried; her sobs denied her utterance; and Owen
involuntarily sat upon a chair, and covered his face with his hand.

To an observing eye it is never difficult to detect the cant of
imposture, or to perceive distress when it is real. The good woman of
the house, as is usual in Ireland, was in the act of approaching them,
unsolicited, with a double handful of meal--that is what the Scotch and
northern Irish call a goivpen, or as much as both hands locked together
can contain--when, noticing their distress, she paused a moment, eyed
them more closely, and exclaimed--

"What's this? Why there's something wrong wid you, good people! But
first an' foremost take this, in the name an' honor of God."

"May the blessin' of the same _Man_* rest upon yees!" replied Kathleen.
"This is a sorrowful thrial to us; for it's our first day to be upon the
world; an' this is the first help of the kind we ever axed for, or ever
got; an' indeed now I find we haven't even a place to carry it in. I've
no--b--b--cloth, or anything to hould it."

* God is sometimes thus termed in Ireland. By "Man"
here is meant person or being. He is also called the
"Man above;" although this must have been intended for,
and often is applied to, Christ only.

"Your first, is it?" said the good woman. "Your first! May the marciful
queen o' heaven look down upon yees, but it's a bitther day yees war
driven out in! Sit down, there, you poor crathur. God pity you, I pray
this day, for you have a heart-broken look! Sit down awhile, near the
fire, you an' the childre! Come over, darlins, an' warm yourselves. Och,
oh! but it's a thousand pities to see sich fine childre--handsome an'
good lookin' even as they are, brought to this! Come over, good man; get
near the fire, for you're wet an' could all of ye. Brian, ludher them
two lazy thieves o' dogs out o' that. _Eiree suas, a wadhee bradagh,
agus go mah a shin!_--be off wid yez, ye lazy divils, that's