however it may be
associated with the ludicrous, I maintain, that it is highly creditable
to the character of the people, and an encouragement to those who wish
to see them receive pure and correct educational knowledge. A
Hedge School, however, in its original sense, was but a temporary
establishment, being only adopted until such a school-house could be
erected, as it was in those days deemed sufficient to hold such a number
of children, as were expected, at all hazards, to attend it.

The opinion, I know, which has been long entertained of Hedge
Schoolmasters, was, and still is, unfavorable; but the character of
these worthy and eccentric persons has been misunderstood, for the
stigma attached to their want of knowledge should have rather been
applied to their want of morals, because, on this latter point, were
they principally indefensible. The fact is, that Hedge Schoolmasters
were a class of men from whom morality was not expected by the
peasantry; for, strange to say, one of their strongest recommendations
to the good opinion of the People, as far as their literary talents and
qualifications were concerned, was an inordinate love of whiskey, and if
to this could be added a slight touch of derangement, the character was
complete.

On once asking an Irish peasant, why he sent his children to a
schoolmaster who was notoriously addicted to spirituous liquors, rather
than to a man of sober habits who taught in the same neighborhood,

"Why do I send them to Mat Meegan, is it?" he replied--"and do you
think, sir," said he, "that I'd send them to that dry-headed dunce, Mr.
Frazher, with his black coat upon him, and his Caroline hat, and him
wouldn't take a glass of poteen wanst in seven years? Mat, sir, likes
it, and teaches the boys ten times betther whin he's dhrunk nor when
he's sober; and you'll never find a good tacher, sir, but's fond of
it. As for Mat, when he's half gone, I'd turn him agin the country for
deepness in learning; for it's then he rhymes it out of him, that it
would do one good to hear him."

"So," said I, "you think that a love of drinking poteen is a sign of
talent in a school-master?"

"Ay, or in any man else, sir," he replied. "Look at tradesmen, and 'tis
always the cleverest that you'll find fond of the drink! If you had hard
Mat and Frazher, the other evening, at it--what a hare Mat made of him!
but he was just in proper tune for it, being, at the time, purty well
I thank you, and did no