indulged in that kind of promiscuous conversation which cannot well
be reported. From a feeling of respect to Helen, no allusion was made
either to the burning of Reilly's property or to Reilly personally. The
only person who had any difficulty in avoiding the subject was the old
squire himself, who more than once found the topic upon his lips, but
with a kind of short cough he gulped it down, and got rid of it for the
time. In what manner he might treat the act itself was a matter which
excited a good deal of speculation in the minds of those who were
present. He was known to be a man who, if the whim seized him to look
upon it as a cowardly and vindictive proceeding, would by no means
scruple to express his opinions strongly against it; whilst, on
the other hand, if he measured it in connection with his daughter's
forbidden attachment to Reilly, he would, of course, as vehemently
express his approbation of the outrage. Indeed, they were induced to
conclude that this latter view of it was that which he was most likely
to take, in consequence of the following proposal, which, from any other
man, would have been an extraordinary one:

"Come, ladies, before you leave us we must have one toast; and I shall
give it in order to ascertain whether we have any fair traitresses among
us, or any who are secretly attached to Popery or Papists."

The proposal was a cruel one, but the squire was so utterly destitute of
consideration or delicacy of feeling that we do not think he ever once
reflected upon the painful position in which it placed his daughter.

"Come," he proceeded, "here is prosperity to Captain Smellpriest and
priest-hunting!"*

* We have been charged by an able and accomplished writer
with an incapacity of describing, with truth, any state of
Irish society above that of our peasantry; and the toast
proposed by the eccentric old squire is, we presume, the
chief ground upon which this charge is rested. We are,
however, just as well aware as our critic, that to propose
toasts before the female portion of the company leave the
dinner-table, is altogether at variance with the usages of
polite society. But we really thought we had guarded our
readers against any such, inference of our own ignorance by
the character which we had drawn of the squire, as well as
by the words with which the toast is introduced--where we
said, "from any other man would have b