dships, real
friendships, amongst those who would look on us as equals and neighbors,
not as usurers and oppressors.

While such was passing in the daughter's mind, the father's thoughts
ran thus: Can she see these old woods, these waving lawns, these
battlemented towers, topping the great oaks of centuries, and yet not
wish to be their mistress? Does no ambition stir her heart to think,
These might be mine? He scanned her features closely, but in her
drooping eyelids and pensive look he could read no signs of the spirit
he sought for.

"Polly," said he, at length, "this is finer, far finer than I expected;
the timber is better grown, the demesne itself more spacious. I hardly
looked for such a princely place."

"It is very beautiful," said she, pensively.

"A proud thing to be the owner of, Polly,--a proud thing! This is
not the home of some wealthy citizen; these trees are like blazons of
nobility, girl."

"One might be very happy here, father," said she, in the same low voice.

"The very thought of my own mind, Polly," cried he, eagerly. "The
highest in the land could ask for nothing better. The estate has been in
his family for four or five generations. The owner of such a place has
but to choose what he would become. If he be talented, and with capacity
for public life, think of him in Parliament, taking up some great
question, assailing some time-worn abuse,--some remnant of that
barbarous code that once enslaved us,--and standing forward as the
leader of an Irish party. How gracefully patriotism would sit on one
who could call this his own! Not the sham patriotism of your envious
plebeian, nor the mock independence of the needy lawyer, but the sturdy
determination to make his country second to none. There 's the Castle
itself," cried he, suddenly, as they emerged into an open space in front
of the building; and, amazed at the spacious and splendid edifice before
them, they both stood several minutes in silent admiration.

"I scarcely thought any Irish gentleman had a fortune to suit this,"
said she, at length.

"You are right, Polly; nor has Carew himself. The debts he will have
incurred to build that Castle will hamper his estate, and cripple him
and those that are to come after him. Nothing short of a large sum of
ready money, enough to clear off every mortgage and incumbrance at once,
could enable this young fellow to save them. Even then, his style
should not be the spendthrift waste they say he is