lishments, were the cause of their not being able to do
what he called their duty by their priest.

Standing in a corner, at the further end of the room, and resting
against a wall, was Joe Reynolds: as Father John had a bad opinion of
this man, and as he was not a parishioner of his, he was returning
without speaking to him, when Joe said,

"You're in the right of it, Father John, not to be axing such a poor
divil as me; you know, betwixt them all, they've not left me the sign
of a copper harp."

"I know, Reynolds, you're too fond of Mrs. Mulready's to have much
for your own priest, let alone another."

"Faix then, Father John, you shouldn't spake agin mother Mulready,
for she's something like your riverence; and a poor boy with an empty
pocket will get neither comfort nor good words from either of ye."

Father John did not think it to be consistent with his dignity to
answer this sally; so he returned to the other end of the room,
carefully counting as he went, and pocketing the money which he had
collected. In the meantime the bride, with such assistance as she
could get, had succeeded in putting the supper on the table: a leg of
mutton at the top, reclining on a vast bed of cabbage; a similar dish
at the bottom; and a ham, with the same garniture, in the middle.
The rest of the table was elegantly sprinkled with plates of smoking
potatoes; and what knives and forks and spoons and plates could be
spared from the head of the table, where a few were laid out with
some little order for the more aristocratic of the guests, were
collected together in a heap. At first, no one seemed inclined to sit
down; every one was struck with a sudden bashfulness, till Father
John, taking up the knife and fork at the top of the table, called
McGovery to bring his wife to supper.

"Now, Denis, my man, don't be thinking of those two pigs, but bring
your better half with you, and let's see how you can behave as a
married man."

"Come, Miss Feemy," said Mary, "if you and the Captain now would jist
sit down, and begin--there's a dear, Miss, do."

"Oh, Mary, nobody must sit down before you, to-night."

"Never mind me, Miss,--if I could only get you and the Captain
seated; yer honer," and she turned round with a curtsey to Ussher,
"there's Denis and Pat there will do nothing in life to help me!" and
the poor woman seemed at her wit's end to know how to arrange her
guests.

At last, however, Ussher and Feemy sat down at one side o