to give them a contrary answer, he was sure to get the
crame of a good welting for his pains. The very landlord was timorous
of them; for when they'd get behind in their rint, hard fortune to the
bailiff, or proctor, or steward, he could find, that would have anything
to say to them. And the more wise they; for maybe, a month would hardly
pass till all belonging to them in the world would be in a heap of
ashes: and who could say who did it? for they were as cunning as foxes.

"If one of them wanted a wife, it was nothing but find out the purtiest
and the richest farmer's daughter in the neighborhood, and next march
into her father's house, at the dead hour of night, tie and gag every
mortal in it, and off with her to some friend's place in another part of
the country. Then what could be done? If the girl's parents didn't like
to give in, their daughter's name was sure to be ruined; at all events,
no other man would think of marrying her, and the only plan was, to make
the best of a bad bargain; and God He knows, it was making a bad
bargain for a girl to have any matrimonial concatenation with the same
O'Hallaghans; for they always had the bad drop in them, from first to
last, from big to little--the blackguards! But wait, it's not over with
them yet.

"The bone of contintion that got, between them and our faction was this
circumstance; their lands and ours were divided by a river that ran down
from the high mountains of Slieve Boglish, and, after a coorse of eight
or ten miles, disembogued itself, first into George Duffy's mill-dam,
and afterwards into that superb stream, the Blackwater, that might be
well and appropriately appellated the Irish Niger. This river, which,
though small at first, occasionally inflated itself to such a gigantic
altitude, that it swept away cows, corn, and cottages, or whatever else
happened to be in the way, was the march ditch, or merin between our
farms. Perhaps it is worth while remarking, as a solution for natural
philosophers, that these inundations were much more frequent in winter
than in summer; though, when they did occur in summer, they were truly
terrific.

"God be with the days, when I and half a dozen gorsoons used to go out,
of a warm Sunday in summer, the bed of the river nothing but a line of
white meandering stones, so hot that you could hardly stand upon, them,
with a small obscure thread of water creeping invisibly among them,
hiding itself, as it were, from the scorchi