knew how to turn it to account in various trifling ways; her turf was never pilfered, nor her ground trespassed upon; neither would any boy, however "arch," venture to throw stones at Mrs. Kane's chickens or goslings. Until the last year, Darby had contrived to pay his rent, and live comfortably; but about this period he had met various hindrances; his cattle died, the price of grain became "next door to nothing," and he fell into arrears. The agent, during Mr. B.'s residence on the continent, had been lenient, and had given him time; but now two gales were due, and Mr. B., just returned home, had expressed himself much dissatisfied with his agent's indulgence" to that mischievous, double-dealing fellow, Darby Kane;" threatening, if not paid up next fair-day, to take possession the following morning. Darby had, therefore, sent his son to the fair with the last remaining cow and horse; but, at the rate of prices then going, it was to be feared that even by the sacrifice of their present comfort, and the means of existence for the ensuing year, they would not be able to make up the whole amount; and Mr. B. (Darby could never turn his tongue to call him master) was not a man to take "with and with" from anybody, still less from one he so much disliked as poor Darby. Peggy, taking some frieze of her father's weaving, and stockings of her mother's knitting, which for softness might almost contend the palm with the famed Connamara fabric, accompanied the brother. Darby and his wife are now sitting, anxiously watching their children's return.

"I think I hear the thramp of a horse," cried the old man, starting from the fit of abstraction in which we left him and his companion. "Did they get enough without sellin' him, I wondher."

"Don't wondher about it, but go out and ax," she said, sharply.

He rose slowly, as if apprehensive of the news he might hear, and had scarcely reached the threshold when he was met by his son. "Ye're welcome, Tim."

"Musha, faith, an' it's no great welcome I have for mysel' thin," replied Tim.

"Ye did not sell him, Tim, honey?"

"No--nor her ayther. Peggy's dhrivin' her afther me."

The father's coming question was interrupted by the harsh tones of the mother's voice.

"What do ye stand cosherin' there for? Come in at onct, and tell what you done, can't ye ?"

"That won't take long," replied the son, a stout well-made lad, with an honest expression of face; "we done nothin'."

"Bad luck to yere sowl and body!" she exclaimed, with such a brow, and such an eye, as no Irish mother but her ever bent on her child, causing her husband to recoil; but which her less sensitive son, hardened by habit, encountered with a certain frank, though respectful, sturdiness.

"And how could I, when nobody was willin' to buy-nor didn't ax the price itsel'?"

"God help uz!" cried Darby; "that's bad news this November night.'

* Small instalments.

"Why don't ye go and ax your friend for it?" said Grania, with a laugh of derision.

"I might do worse," he replied, quietly.

"We'll have to take the bag on our backs to-morrow," she observed, doggedly, "and lave our blessin' to them that brought uz to it."

Peggy now entered, unwelcomed by her mother; and the little group sat in silence round the hearth, which was never again to blaze for them. They were roused from their melancholy cogitations by a "God save all here!" pronounced in a low voice by some one at the door-way.

"Thank you kindly-the same to you, whoever you are,” replied the father and son simultaneously.

On turning round, they saw by the light of the fire the gleaming of military accoutrements-two figures stood at the entrance.

"Won't ye come in, and take an air of the fire, gentlemen ?" said Tim.

The men advanced, and took the proffered seats, Darby doing the honours of his house with the characteristic courtesy of his country, little as he could be supposed inclined under present circumstances to receive strangers. In these civilities he was assisted by his son only; the wife sat gloomily silent; and Peggy was busy preparing the evening meal, and besides was 66 shy of the sogers."

"An' so ye're on furlough, goin' to see ye're friends," said Darby, making an effort to appear interested. "Are they in this part of the counthry, gintlemin."

The one addressed hesitated for a moment, but his comrade answered hurriedly, in a low voice-" Back in Connamara.”

"But ye ar'n't brothers-one of you spakes like an Englishman." "We're next to brothers; better maybe, old friend," said the Irish soldier.

Peggy had by this time drained the potatoes, and they now lay smoking in the skib,* and a piece of bacon along with them.

"As ye're afther a long walk, maybe you'd take a bit with us, gintlemin?"

The soldiers declined, but accepted his offer of a glass.

"Here's to your health, sir, and your's, ma'am," nodding to Grania, who seemed scarcely conscious of their presence.

"And may you be as happy as I shall be this time to-morrow,” added the young Irishman, his voice slightly faltering.

"Thankee kindly," replied Darby with a sigh. "I've a boy of my own a soger," he added, after a pause, and hav'n't seen him these twelve years. Maybe you might know him, gintlemin?"

"How can they tell whether they do or no, whin they don't know his name?" said Grania. "He's one Owen Kane-did ye ever hear tell of him?" she added, looking up eagerly at the Irish soldier, who was seated, his head leaning on his hand, in the corner near

her.

"He does," he replied, pointing to his companion.

"Oh! then, God bless ye! an' tell me whin you seen him."

*A wicker drainer.

"Not long ago, ma'am. He's on his way home by this." Grania clasped her hands tightly to her bosom, as if she already held her darling to her heart. "He will be welcome- welcome!" she murmured, in the low deep passionate tones of intense emotion. The Irish soldier rose abruptly, and walked towards the door, followed by his comrade.

"Ye're not goin', gintlemin?" asked Darby. "The night's dark an' cold, an' ye can stop here, an' welcome."

The Englishman accepted the offer on behalf of his companion, who stood silent and thoughtful at his side; but declined it on his own account, being anxious to reach as quickly as possible the town of -, where a sister lived, who was waiting his arrival. He however reseated himself at the fire, and the other soldier soon after rejoined him.

"Owen must be a fine man by this," Peggy observed to the Englishman, who had been, during the evening, apparently very desirous to become better acquainted with her; and who consequently struck her as being "far beyant the other, who sat, without spakin' a word, in the corner; lookin' at them undher his eyes, whin nobody ud be mindin' him."

"Indeed he is a tight lad," the Englishman replied; "but 'tis so long since you saw him, ma'am," turning to Grania, "that I dare say you wouldn't know your son now."

"Not know him!" she repeated, with a laugh.

" Owneen, my curly-headed boy! is it the mother that had ye sleeping at her bosom, and that sees your blue eyes an' fair skin, whatever she looks upon, not to know ye?"

"But twelve years have passed since you last saw him—you should recollect that, ma'am. Owen must be greatly changed."

"Not so, but the mother's eye would know him; and supposin' she couldn't see him itsel', nor hear his voice, the mother's heart would feel when the child was near her."

"Your are very fond of your son," observed the Irish soldier. "He ought to love you."

"So he does," she replied.

"Did he write regularly to you?"

"He hadn't the time, maybe; or the letthers went asthray."

"You ar❜n't inclined to be hard on him, at any rate."

“Hard on Owen! who could have the heart to be that?"

Shortly after, the Englishman took his leave; and a little room off the kitchen was in the course of the evening prepared by Peggy for the other soldier, who, pleading extreme fatigue, and the necessity of rising betimes to pursue his journey on the morrow, retired rather early in the night; previously to which he had delivered into Mrs. Kane's charge a small roll of paper, containing money, "which he was afraid of dropping on the floor, or perhaps lighting his pipe with it in the dark, before he started in the morning."

Darby and Peggy did not remain long after him.

Grania looked into the paper, and took out two bank-notes, one of ten, another of five pounds. "Just the rint!" she exclaimed.

"Sorrow take it for rint!" said Tim.

"This time to-morrow we

shan't have a house over our heads, God help uz!"

brow contracted.

Grania stood motionless: her dark eye alternately resting on her son, and on the paper she grasped her colour came and went-her They'll have their will of uz at last," she muttered; "and Owen comin' home and all, to find uz beggars, puttin' him to shame!"

"Whatever shame there's in it, we have our own share of it, and the largest one, to my notion; to say nothin' of the hardship," Tim rejoined, displeased at the undue partiality which, at such a time as the present, should be more affected by the mortification of one child than by the ruin of the others.

Hardship indeed!" she repeated contemptuously.

"What else were ye born to?" But she added hurriedly, "He was the eldest, you know; and we were betther off that time, an' brought him up more kindher."

Whether satisfied or not with his mother's explanation, Tim made no rejoinder; and after a sigh, and a stretch of his wearied limbs, and a muttered curse on high rents and low prices, he leaned his head on the dresser, and fell asleep. He was awakened out of a dream about "a pot of gold he had discovered under the big hawthorn in the garden," by his mother's voice whispering in his ear, "Tim, asthore, will we give the soger back his money?"

"To be sure!" he replied drowsily. "What else ud we do wid it?" And he settled himself again to sleep.

"Omadhaun!" she muttered between her ground teeth. "Don't be fillin' up the place here," she added, angrily; "if you can't keep yoursel' awake the last night ever you'll pass undher this roof, in the name of the God or the devil, go to bed at onct."

Tim, habitually obedient, rose, and stumbled up the loft; and not long after his mother had audible proofs that the change of place had not affected his sleeping powers.

She crept to the room where her husband and daughter lay-all was quiet. She raised the latch of the cabin door. From the village, about a quarter of a mile distant, no sound reached her. The night was still, dark, and cheerless. She stole softly to the soldier's room, and listened awhile to his hard breathing.

"If I could help it!" she muttered, and clasped her head with her large bony hands, almost burying the knuckles in her throbbing temples; "but they'll have their will o' me afther all I struv-all I done to kindher 'em. An' it's just the rint, and Owen coming back -the child of my heart-his child!"

An hour, perhaps more, passed. At length Grania started from her seat in the chimney corner, snatched up a rushlight, and shading the flame with her hand, approached the soldier's room, turned the lock gently, and entered.

On awakening early next morning, Darby was surprised to find his wife already risen. He went to the kitchen, and there heard from

Peggy that her mother had left the house" to see and borrow the money from a neighbour, but she did not say who."

"God help her!" said Darby; "she'll only have the walk for her pains. But where's the young man ?"

"He went off a little before hersel', my mother told me."

"God speed him! but I'm sorry he wint the road on an empty stomach. My heart warmed to him somehow; in regard of being a soger, like my own poor boy, I suppose."

After some hours Grania returned. She looked worn and fatigued, and, without speaking, seated herself at the fire.

"You didn't get it, Grania, asthore?" said her husband affectionately, seeing disappointment, as he thought, on her dark haggard features.

“I did,” she replied, in a hoarse voice.

"Glory be to his holy name!" Darby murmured, clasping his hands in pious thanksgiving.

Her lip curled into an expression that, had he noticed it, would have curdled his blood.

"An' where is it, asthore ?" he continued.

"I've given it to them I got it for."

"You done well, agra; we ought to be thankful to you this mornin' anyhow; for only but for you we would be in a bad way. Indeed, I'll back ye agin any woman in the barony, for the foot an' hand that never wearies, and the plannin' head. I never thought now of borrying at all-only just said my prayers and left the rest to God Almighty; an' you see he put the good thoughts in your heart."

"The good thoughts!" she muttered, with a low hoarse laugh that grated on her husband's ear.

And to turn the subject, he desired Peggy to look out a hot potato for her mother.

"I don't want it-I'm not hungry."

"I'm afraid 'tis sick ye are, Grania."

She made no reply, but sat crouched on the ground, her face buried between her knees, in sullen silence.

Peggy, who had gone out with the refuse of their meal to the pig, now ran in, blushing-" Here's the English soger, father."

The person announced in a few seconds made his appearance."Well, Mrs. Kane," he said, smiling, "where's my comrade?" "Gone to his friends, to be sure," she replied, in a surly tone; "where else ud he be ?"

The soldier laughed loudly." Gone to his friends?"-that's a good un, to be sure!-Gone to his friends! Well, I never see'd people more regularly hummed in all my life!"

""Tisn't thrue, then, that he belongs to this counthry?" Darby said. “Why, I've a notion he does;-but what did he say when he left you?"

“Grania, you saw him last-what did he say ?"

"Nothing."

"Nothing? What a queer lad he must be!-but I think he's carrying the joke too far now."

"Why, what's the joke about?" Darby asked.