he hunting-field. The countess
had expressed herself as very grateful for young Fitzgerald's care,
and thus an intimacy had sprung up. Owen had gone there once or twice
to see the lad, and on those occasions had dined there; and on one
occasion, at the young earl's urgent request, had stayed and slept.

And then the good-natured people of Muskerry, Duhallow, and Desmond
began, of course, to say that the widow was going to marry the young
man. And why not? she was still a beautiful woman; not yet forty by a
good deal, said the few who took her part; or at any rate, not much
over, as was admitted by the many who condemned her. We, who have
been admitted to her secrets, know that she was then in truth only
thirty-eight. She was beautiful, proud, and clever; and if it would
suit her to marry a handsome young fellow with a good house and an
unembarrassed income of eight hundred a year, why should she not
do so? As for him, would it not be a great thing for him to have a
countess for his wife, and an earl for his stepson?

What ideas the countess had on this subject we will not just now
trouble ourselves to inquire. But as to young Owen Fitzgerald, we
may declare at once that no thought of such a wretched alliance ever
entered his head. He was sinful in many things, and foolish in many
things. But he had not that vile sin, that unmanly folly, which would
have made a marriage with a widowed countess eligible in his eyes,
merely because she was a countess, and not more than fifteen years
his senior. In a matter of love he would as soon have thought of
paying his devotions to his far-away cousin, old Miss Barbara
Beamish, of Ballyclahassan, of whom it was said that she had set her
cap at every unmarried man that had come into the west riding of the
county for the last forty years. No; it may at any rate be said of
Owen Fitzgerald, that he was not the man to make up to a widowed
countess for the sake of the reflected glitter which might fall on
him from her coronet.

But the Countess of Desmond was not the only lady at Desmond Court. I
have before said that she had a daughter, the Lady Clara, the heroine
of this coming story; and it may be now right that I should attempt
some short description of her; her virtues and faults, her merits and
defects. It shall be very short; for let an author describe as he
will, he cannot by such course paint the characters of his personages
on the minds of his readers. It is by gradual, earnest