ice, undertake either to
reconsider your claims, or by an extraordinary exercise of the powers
vested in them by the Act of Teddy the Tiler, chap. 4, sees. 9 and 10,
appoint you in the way and manner you propose. So much, my dear Gorman,
old Rivers declared to me this morning, confidentially adding, I
wish that Irish party would understand that, when we could buy them
altogether in a basket, as in O'Connell's day, the arrangement was
satisfactory; but to have to purchase them separately--each potato by
himself--is a terrible loss of time, and leads to no end of higgling.
Why can't you agree amongst yourselves,--make your bargain, and then
divide the spoils quietly? It is the way your forefathers understood
the law of commonage, and nobody ever grumbled that his neighbor had a
cow or a pig too many! The English of all this is, they don't want you
just now, and they won't have you, for you 're an article that never
kept well, and, even when bonded, your loss by leakage is considerable.

"Every Irishman I ever met makes the same mistake of offering himself
for sale when the commodity is not wanted. If you see muffs and boas in
Regent Street in July, ain't they always ticketed 'a great sacrifice'?
Can't you read the lesson? But so it is with you. You fancy you 'll
induce people to travel a bad road by putting up a turnpike.

"I 'm sorry to say all this to you, but I see plainly politics will not
do any longer as a pursuit. It is not only that all appointments are so
scrutinized nowadays, but that every man's name in a division is weighed
and considered in a fashion that renders a mere majority of less moment
than the fact of how it was composed. If I cannot manage something for
you in the West Indies, you must try Cheltenham.

"Rivers has just sent for me.

"'What of your friend O'Shea? Did n't you tell me he was in the north of
Italy?'

"'Yes,' said I; 'he's getting up the Italian question. He has
accumulated a mass of facts which will astonish the House next session.'

"'Confound his facts!' muttered he. 'Here has been Lord Sommerville with
me, about some young ward of his. I don't well understand what he wants,
or what he wishes me to do; but the drift is, to find some one--a
gentleman, of course--who would take charge of the boy for a short time;
he is a marquis, with large expectations, and one day or other will be a
man of mark.'

"I tried the dignity tone, but old Rivers interrupted me quickly,--

"'Yes, yes