other challenger to the
schoolmaster, in the capacity of a candidate for his situation, and if
successful, drove him out of the district, and established himself in
his situation. The vanquished master sought a new district, sent a new
challenge, in his turn, to some other teacher, and usually put him to
flight in the same manner. The terms of defeat or victory, according to
their application, were called sacking and bogging. "There was a great
argument entirely, sir," said a peasant once, when speaking of these
contests, "'twas at the chapel on Sunday week, betiane young Tom Brady,
that was a poor scholar in Munsther, and Mr. Hartigan the schoolmaster."

"And who was victorious?" I inquired. "Why, sir, and maybe 'twas young
Brady that didn't sack him clane before the priest and all, and went
nigh to bog the priest himself in Greek. His Reverence was only two
words beyant him; but he sacked the masther any how, and showed him in
the Grammatical and Dixonary where he was Wrong."

"And what is Brady's object in life?" I asked. "What does he intend to
do."

"Intend to do, is it? I am tould nothing less nor going into Trinity
College in Dublin and expects to bate them all there, out and out:
he's first to make something they call a seizure; (* Sizar) and, afther
making that good he's to be a counsellor. So, sir, you see what it is to
resave good schoolin', and to have the larnin'; but, indeed, it's Brady
that's the great head-piece entirely."

Unquestionably, many who received instruction in this manner have
distinguished themselves in the Dublin University; and I have no
hesitation in saying, that young men educated in Irish hedge schools, as
they were called, have proved themselves to be better classical scholars
and mathematicians, generally speaking, than any proportionate number
of those educated in our first-rate academies. The Munstor masters have
long been, and still are, particularly celebrated for making excellent
classical and mathematical scholars.

That a great deal of ludicrous pedantry generally accompanied this
knowledge is not at all surprising, when we consider the rank these
worthy teachers held in life, and the stretch of inflation at which
their pride was kept by the profound reverence excited by their learning
among the people. It is equally true, that each of them had a stock
of _crambos_ ready for accidental encounter, which would have puzzled
Euclid or Sir Isaac Newton himself; but even these t