astle, whose
superlative tastes were wont to overshadow mere Irish pretension,
endeavored to compete with these noted equestrians. Secretaries' wives
and chamberlains' daughters, however they might domineer in other
matters, were here, at least, surpassed, and it was a conceded fact,
that the Kennyfecks rode better, dressed better, and looked better on
horseback than any other girls in the country. If all the critics as to
horsemanship pronounced the elder unequivocally the superior rider,
mere admirers of gracefulness preferred the younger sister, who,
less courageous and self-possessed, invested her skill with a certain
character of timidity that increased the interest her appearance
excited.

They never rode out without an immense _cortege_ of followers, every
well-looking and well-mounted man about town deeming it his _devoir_ to
join this party, just as the box of the reigning belle at the opera is
besieged by assiduous visitors The very being seen in this train was
a kind of brevet promotion in fashionable esteem, to which each
newly-arrived cornet aspired, and thus the party usually presented
a group of brilliant uniforms and dancing plumes that rivalled in
brilliancy, and far excelled in amusement, the staff of the viceroy
himself.

It would be uufair to suppose that, with all their natural innocence
and artlessness, they were entirely ignorant of the sway they thus
exercised; indeed, such a degree of modesty would have trenched upon the
incredulous, for how could they doubt what commanders of the forces
and deputy-assistant-adjutants assured them, still less question the
veracity of a prince royal, who positively asserted that they "rode
better than Quentin's daughter"?

It was thus a source of no small excitement among the mounted loungers
of the capital, when the Kennyfecks issued forth on horseback, and not,
as usual, making the tour of the "Square" to collect their forces, they
rode at once down Grafton Street, accompanied by a single cavalier.

"Who have the Kennyfeck girls got with them?" said a
thin-waisted-looking aide-de-camp to a lanky, well-whiskered fellow in a
dragoon undress, at the Castle gate.

"He is new to me--never saw him before. I say, Lucas, who is that tall
fellow on Kennyfeck's brown horse--do you know him?"

"Don't know--can't say," drawled out a very diminutive hussar cornet.

"He has a look of Merrington," said another, joining the party.

"Not a bit of it; he's much larger.