uck that sent the
leg clane aff his body in my father's hands; down wint the squire over
the table, an' bang wint my father half way across the room on his back,
upon the flure. Whin he kem to himself the cheerful mornin' sun was
shinin' through the windy shutthers, an' he was lying flat an his back,
with the leg iv one of the great ould chairs pulled clane out iv the
socket an' tight in his hand, pintin' up to the ceilin', an' ould Larry
fast asleep, an' snorin' as loud as ever. My father wint that mornin' to
Father Murphy, an' from that to the day of his death, he never neglected
confission nor mass, an' what he tould was betther believed that he spake
av it but seldom. An', as for the squire, that is the sperit, whether it
was that he did not like his liquor, or by rason iv the loss iv his leg,
he was never known to walk again."

* * * * *

THE MYSTERIOUS LODGER

PART I

About the year 1822 I resided in a comfortable and roomy old house, the
exact locality of which I need not particularise, further than to say
that it was not very far from Old Brompton, in the immediate
neighbourhood, or rather continuity (as even my Connemara readers
perfectly well know), of the renowned city of London.

Though this house was roomy and comfortable, as I have said, it was not,
by any means, a handsome one. It was composed of dark red brick, with
small windows, and thick white sashes; a porch, too--none of your flimsy
trellis-work, but a solid projection of the same vermillion
masonry--surmounted by a leaded balcony, with heavy, half-rotten
balustrades, darkened the hall-door with a perennial gloom. The mansion
itself stood in a walled enclosure, which had, perhaps, from the date of
the erection itself, been devoted to shrubs and flowers. Some of the
former had grown there almost to the dignity of trees; and two dark
little yews stood at each side of the porch, like swart and inauspicious
dwarfs, guarding the entrance of an enchanted castle. Not that my
domicile in any respect deserved the comparison: it had no reputation as
a haunted house; if it ever had any ghosts, nobody remembered them. Its
history was not known to me: it may have witnessed plots, cabals, and
forgeries, bloody suicides and cruel murders. It was certainly old enough
to have become acquainted with iniquity; a small stone slab, under the
balustrade, and over the arch of the porch I mentioned, had the date
1672