!_" said Reillaghan, bitterly, in Irish, "but I doubt
the red-handed villain has cut short the lives of my two brave sons!
I only hope he may stop in the country: I'm not widout friends an'
followers that 'ud think it no sin in a just cause to pay him in his own
coin, an' to take from him an' his a pound o' blood for every ounce of
ours they shed."

A number of his friends instantly volunteered to retrace their way to
the mountains, and search for the other son. "There's little danger
of his life," said a relation; "it's a short time Frank 'ud stand him
particularly as the gun wasn't charged. We'll go, at any rate, for
'fraid he might lose himself in the mountains, or walk into some o' the
lochs on his way home. We had as good bring some whiskey wid us, for he
may want it badly."

While they had been speaking, however, the snow began to fall and the
wind to blow in a manner that promised a heavy and violent storm. They
proceeded, notwithstanding, on their search, and on whistling for the
dog, discovered that he was not to be found.

"He went wid us to the mountains, I know," said the former speaker; "an'
I think it likely he'll be found wid Owen, wherever he is. Come, boys,
step out: it's a dismal night, any way, the Lord knows.

"Och, och!" And with sorrowful but vigorous steps they went in quest of
the missing brother.

Nothing but the preternatural character of the words which Were so
mysteriously pronounced immediately before Owen's pursuit of M'Kenna,
could have prevented that circumstance, together with the flight of the
latter, from exciting greater attention among the crowd. His absence,
however, now that they had time to reflect on it, produced unusual
alarm, not only on account of M'Kenna's bad character, but from the
apprehension of Owen being lost in the mountains.

The inextinguishable determination of revenge with which an Irishman
pursues any person who, either directly or indirectly, takes the life
of a near relation, or invades the peace of his domestic affections,
was strongly illustrated by the nature of Owen's pursuit after M'Kenna,
considering the appalling circumstances under which he undertook it. It
is certainly more than probable that M'Kenna, instead of flying would
have defended himself with the loaded gun, had not his superstitious
fears been excited by the words which so mysteriously charged him with
the murder. The direction he accidentally took led both himself and his
pursuer into