'Let it
run,' says I, in the joy of me heart, 'and you after it, and the
barra on the top of ye, now Micky me son's come home!'"

"Wonderfully jolly!" said I. "And it must be pleasant even to think
of it."

There is another new character in the second part of "We," who is also
a fine picture:--Alister the blue-eyed Scotch lad, with his respect
for "book-learning," and his powers of self-denial and endurance; but
Julie certainly had a weakness for the Irish nation, and the tender
grace with which she touches Dennis O'Moore and Biddy shines
conspicuously throughout the story. In one scene, however, I think she
brings up her Scotch hero neck-and-neck, if not ahead, of her
favourite Irishman.

This is in Chapter VII., where an entertainment is being held on board
ship, and Dennis and Alister are called upon in turn to amuse the
company with a song. Dennis gets through his ordeal well; he has a
beautiful voice, which makes him independent of the accompaniment of a
fiddle (the only musical instrument on board), and Julie describes his
_simpatico_ rendering of "Bendemeer's Stream" from the way in which
she loved to hear one of our brothers sing it. He had learned it by
ear on board ship from a fellow-passenger, and she was never tired of
listening to the melody. When this same brother came to visit her
whilst she was ill at Bath, and sang to her as she lay in
bed,--"Bendemeer's Stream" was the one strain she asked for, and the
last she heard.

Dennis O'Moore's performance met with warm applause, and then the
boatswain, who had a grudge against Alister, because the Scotch
Captain treated his countryman with leniency, taunted the shy and
taciturn lad to "contribute to the general entertainment."

I was very sorry for Alister, and so was Dennis, I was sure, for he
did his best to encourage him.

"Sing 'GOD Save the Queen,' and I'll keep well after ye
with the fiddle," he suggested. But Alister shook his head. "I know
one or two Scotch tunes," Dennis added, and he began to sketch out
an air or two with his fingers on the strings.

Presently Alister stopped him. "Yon's the Land o' the Leal?"

"It is," said Dennis.

"Play it a bit quicker, man, and I'll try 'Scots, wha hae.'"

Dennis quickened at once, and Alister stood forward. He neither
fidgeted nor complained of feeling shy, but, as my eyes (I was
squatted cross-legged on the deck) were