want is, for ye to come over to the house, and get into
the bed."

"Not beside the corpse?" said my father, trembling.

"By no means, but by yourself; and you 're to pretend to be my father,
and that ye want to make yer will before ye die; and then I 'll send for
the neighbors, and Billy Scanlan the schoolmaster, and ye 'll tell him
what to write, laving all the farm and everything to me,--ye understand.
And as the neighbors will see ye, and hear yer voice, it will never be
believed but that it was himself that did it."

"The room must be very dark," says my father.

"To be sure it will, but have no fear! Nobody will dare to come nigh the
bed; and ye 'll only have to make a cross with yer pen under the name."

"And the priest?" said my father.

"My father quarrelled with him last week about the Easter dues, and
Father Tom said he 'd not give him the 'rites,' and that's lucky now!
Come along now, quick, for we 've no time to lose; it must be all
finished before the day breaks."

My father did not lose much time at his toilet, for he just wrapped his
big coat 'round him, and slipping on his brogues, left the house. I
sat up in the basket and listened till they were gone some minutes; and
then, in a costume as light as my parent's, set out after them, to
watch the course of the adventure. I thought to take a short cut, and
be before them; but by bad luck I fell into a bog-hole, and only escaped
being drowned by a chance. As it was, when I reached the house, the
performance had already begun.

I think I see the whole scene this instant before my eyes, as I sat on
a little window with one pane, and that a broken one, and surveyed the
proceeding. It was a large room, at one end of which was a bed, and
beside it a table, with physic-bottles, and spoons, and teacups; a
little farther off was another table, at which sat Billy Scanlan, with
all manner of writing materials before him. The country people sat two,
sometimes three, deep round the walls, all intently eager and anxious
for the coming event. Peter himself went from place to place, trying
to smother his grief, and occasionally helping the company to whiskey,
which was supplied with more than accustomed liberality.

All my consciousness of the deceit and trickery could not deprive the
scene of a certain solemnity. The misty distance of the half-lighted
room; the highly wrought expression of the country people's faces,
never more intensely excited than at some mo