ch
he persisted in ascribing to causes outside of himself. Generous,
kind-hearted, and benevolent, he easily forgave an injury, never
willingly inflicted one; he was also, however, hot-tempered and
passionate; he could not brook opposition to his will, where its object
seemed laudable to himself, and was utterly unable to make allowance
for prejudices and leanings in others, simply because he had never
experienced them in his own breast.

Such was, in a few words, the present occupant of "the Lodge"--as the
residence of the agent was styled. Originally a hunting box, it had
been enlarged and ornamented by Captain Hemsworth, and converted into a
cottage of singular beauty, without, and no mean pretension to comfort,
within doors. It occupied an indenture of the glen of Keim-an-eigh, and
stood on the borders of a small mountain-lake, the surface of which
was dotted with wooded islands. Behind the cottage, and favoured by
the shelter of the ravine, the native oaks grew to a great size, and
contrasted by the rich foliage waving in the breeze, with the dark sides
of the cliff opposite, rugged, barren and immutable.

In all the luxuriance of this mild climate, shrubs attained the height
of trees; and flowers, rare enough elsewhere to demand the most watchful
care, grew here, unattended and unregarded. The very grass had a depth
of green, softer and more pleasing to the eye than in other places. It
seemed as if nature had, in compensation for the solitude around, shed
her fairest gifts over this lonely spot, one bright gem in the dreary
sky of winter.

About a mile further down the glen, and seated on a lofty pinnacle of
rock, immediately above the road, stood the once proud castle of the
O'Donoghue. Two square and massive towers still remained to mark its
ancient strength, and the ruins of various outworks and bastions could
be traced, extending for a considerable distance on every side. Between
these square towers, and occupying the space where originally a curtain
wall stood, a long low building now extended, whose high-pitched roof
and narrow windows vouched for an antiquity of little more than a
hundred years. It was a strange incongruous pile, in which fortress and
farm-house seemed welded together--the whole no bad type of its past and
its present owners. The approach was by a narrow causeway, cut in the
rock, and protected by a square keep, through whose deep arch the road
penetrated--flanked on either hand by a low