ain. On the road he was faced by a string of laughing girls, and
among them there was little Mary Driscoll. Mary had then, no doubt,
such grace as youth can give, and that she had, at least, good teeth,
was obvious to the disgruntled Michael Twomey, as she was grinning at
him from ear to ear. Also, possibly, his sight may not even then have
been of the best. Be that as it may, Michael caught at Mary's arm.

"Come on to the chapel, Mary!" he shouted at her, in the Irish that
was a more common speech in those days than it is now; "The priest is
there yet, and the money is in my pocket. I'll marry you!"

Michael had made a luckier hit than he knew. Little Mary Driscoll
recognised the sporting quality of the suggestion, and being a girl of
spirit acceded to it.

Mary had been to America. She was one of the many of her class who put
forth fearlessly for the United States, adventuring upon the unknown
without any of the qualms that would beset them were the bourne
London, or even one of the cities of their native land. Wasn't Mary's
mother's sisther's daughter, and Maggie Brian from Tullagh, and the
dear knows how many more cousins and neighbours, before her in it?
Didn't her brother that was marrit in it, send her her ticket, and
wasn't there good money to be airned in it?

These queries, that, as may be seen by anyone with half an eye,
answered themselves, having been propounded by little Mary Driscoll,
she, roaring crying, and keened by all her relatives to the
coach-door--no railway being within thirty miles of her home--departed
to America, and was swallowed up by "Boyshton" for the space of five
years, during the passage of which, since she could neither read nor
write, no communication passed between her and her parents, save only
the postal orders that, through an intermediary, she unfailingly sent
them. Then there was a month that the postal order came not, and while
the old father and mother were wondering was Mary dead, or what ailed
her, Mary walked in, uglier than ever in her Boyshton clothes, and it
was gloriously realised that not only was not Mary dead at all, but
that she had as much saved as would bury the old people, or maybe
marry herself.

Mary had not enjoyed America. She wouldn't get her health in it, she
said.

("Ye wouldn't see a fat face or a red cheek on one o' thim that comes
back," assented Mary's mother); and for as little as she was, Mary
continued, she'd rather bring her bones home with