, whin she saw that me mind was set on it, she consinted, and
did her best, poor woman, to sind me away lookin' dacent and
respectable. I niver saw me father or me stepmother agin. I had no wish
to see her; but, although I knew me father no longer loved me, I had
still some natral-like feelin's for him; but, as I had run away from
home, I durst not go back, an' so I lift Ireland widout a sight uv him.
But I _could_ not lave it foriver, as it might be, widout one more sight
uv me mother's grave. I rached the small village where me father lived
about nightfall, and lodged in the house uv a kind neighbor who
befrinded me, an' he promised, at my earnest wish, to say nothing to any
one uv my wish. Early in the morning, before any one was astir in the
village, I stole away to the churchyard where they buried me mother. I
knelt down, I did, an' kissed the sods which covered her grave, an'
prayed that the blessin' which she pronounced before she died, wid her
hand restin' on me head, might follow me wheriver I might go." The boy
took from his pocket a small parcel, carefully inclosed in a paper,
which he handed to me, saying "I gathered these shamrocks from off me
mother's grave, before I lift it forever." My own eyes grew moist as I
gazed upon the now withered shamrock leaves which the poor boy prized so
highly. Would that they had proved as a talisman to guard him from evil!
I listened with much interest to Terry's story till our conversation was
suddenly interrupted by Mr. ---- calling him, in no very gentle tones, to
go and drive home the cows from the pasture. To reach this pasture he
must needs pass through about a quarter of a mile of thick woods. He had
a great dread of walking alone in the woods, which his imagination
filled with wild animals. When he returned that evening he seemed very
much terrified, and when questioned as to the cause, he replied that he
"had met with a wild baste in the woods, and was kilt entirely wid the
fright uv it."

We endeavoured to gain from him a description of the animal he had
seen, but for some time were unable. "What color was the animal?"
enquired Mrs. ----. "Indade Ma'am, an' its jist the color uv a dog he
was," answered Terry. This reply was greeted with a burst of laughter
from all present, at which he was highly offended. In order to pacify
him I said, "we would not laugh at you, Terry, only that dogs are of so
many different colors that we are as much in the dark as ever regardin