rty of the visitors
one after another, but he had the knowledge of his being trusted as
not every Irishman would have been. A service of six months to the
secretaryship established his reputation as the strange bird of a queer
species: not much less quiet, honest, methodical, than an Englishman,
and still impulsive, Irish still; a very strange bird.

The disposition of the English to love the children of Erin, when not
fretted by them, was shown in the treatment Patrick received from the
Mattock family. It is a love resembling the affection of the stage-box
for a set of favourite performers, and Patrick, a Celt who had schooled
his wits to observe and meditate, understood his position with them as
one of the gallant and amusing race, as well as the reason why he had
won their private esteem. They are not willingly suspicious: it agitates
their minds to be so; and they are most easily lulled by the flattery
of seeing their special virtues grafted on an alien stock: for in this
admiration of virtues that are so necessary to the stalwart growth of
man, they become just sensible of a minor deficiency; the tree, if we
jump out of it to examine its appearance, should not be all trunk. Six
months of ungrudging unremunerated service, showing devotion to the good
cause and perfect candour from first to last, was English, and a poetic
touch beyond: so that John Mattock, if he had finished the sentence
instead of lopping it with an interjection, would have said: 'These
Irish fellows, when they're genuine and first rate!--are pretty well
the pick of the land.' Perhaps his pause on the interjection expressed
a doubt of our getting them genuine. Mr. O'Donnell was a sort of
exceptional Irishman, not devoid of practical ability in a small way--he
did his duties of secretary fairly well; apparently sincere--he had
refrained from courting Jane; an odd creature enough, what with his
mixture of impulsiveness and discretion; likeable, pleasant to entertain
and talk to; not one of your lunatics concerning his country--he could
listen to an Englishman's opinion on that head, listen composedly to
Rockney, merely seeming to take notes; and Rockney was, as Captain Con
termed him, Press Dragoon about Ireland, a trying doctor for a child of
the patient.

On the whole, John Mattock could shake his hand heartily when he
was leaving our shores. Patrick was released by Miss Grace Barrow's
discovery at last of a lady capable of filling his place: a ci