m dark since I was nine years old.'

'I'm the ouldest man in the town-land,' said an old fellow with a white
beard, and a blanket strapped round him.

[Illustration: 2-0248]

While bursting through the crowd came a strange, odd-looking figure,
in a huntsman's coat and cap, but both so patched and tattered, it was
difficult to detect their colour. 'Here's Joe, your honour,' cried he,
putting his hand to his mouth at the same moment. 'Tally-ho! ye ho! ye
yo!' he shouted, with a mellow cadence I never heard surpassed. 'Yow!
yow! yow!' he cried, imitating the barking of dogs, and then uttering
a long, low wail, like the bay of a hound, he shouted out, 'Hark away
t hark away!' and at the same moment pranced into the thickest of the
crowd, upsetting men, women, and children as he went--the curses of
some, the cries of others, and the laughter of nearly all ringing
through the motley mass, making their misery look still more frightful.

[Illustration: 252]

Throwing what silver I had about me amongst them, I made my way towards
the hotel--not alone, however, but heading a procession of my ragged
friends, who, with loud praises of my liberality, testified their
gratitude by bearing me company. Arrived at the porch, I took my luggage
from the carrier, and entered the house. Unlike any other hotel I had
ever seen, there was neither stir nor bustle, no burly landlord, no
buxom landlady, no dapper waiter with napkin on his arm, no pert-looking
chambermaid with a bedroom candlestick. A large hall, dirty and
unfurnished, led into a kind of bar, upon whose unpainted shelves a few
straggling bottles were ranged together, with some pewter measures and
tobacco-pipes; while the walls were covered with placards, setting forth
the regulations for the Grand Canal Hotel, with a list, copious and
abundant, of all the good things to be found therein, with the prices
annexed; and a pressing entreaty to the traveller, should he not feel
satisfied with his reception, to mention it in a 'book kept for that
purpose by the landlord.' I cast my eye along the bill of fare so
ostentatiously put forth--I read of rump-steaks and roast-fowls, of
red rounds and sirloins, and I turned from the spot resolved to explore
farther. The room opposite was large and spacious, and probably destined
for the coffee-room, but it also was empty; it had neither chair nor
table, and save a pictorial representation of a canal-boat, drawn
by some native artist with a bu