And Turner, the Agint, looked back to the house: "Well, yer "That's a case for eviction; we'll scarce see a pinny while wan o' thim stez. Why, they have n't a goose or a hin, let alone e'er a baste on the land, So where we're to look for our money is more nor I under stand. But in coorse the man 's axin' for time." An' sez t' other, "Con "Tis their thrade to be axin' for that, if ye're axin' a pound for your purse. They may have their damned time, sure, an' welcome, as long as they plase, on'y first They'll pay up or clear out." An' the Agint he laughed till ye'd think he 'd ha' burst. An' sez he, "Thin clear out' 'll be the word, and my notion's we'll find that it pays, If we pull down thim ould sticks o' cabins, an' put in the cattle to graze; Faith, I'd liefer see sheep on the land than the likes o' that breed any day," Sez he, pointin' his hand to the dike, where the childher, poor sowls, were at play. An' the Lord sez, "It's on'y a pity we can't git the lap of a wave Just for wanst, o'er the whole o' the counthry; no end to the throuble 't would save, And lave the place clane." An' the Agint laughed hearty; sez he: "Our best start, Since we can't git thim under the wather, is sendin' thim over it smart. An' these Flynns here we'd imigraph aisy; they've several lads nearly grown; The on'y dhrawback 's the ould father, we 'll just have to let him alone, For the son sez he's sheer past his work, an' that niver 'ud do in the States; It's a burthen he's been on their hands for this great while he 'll go on the rates. Sure, the Union's the place for the likes of him, so long as he bides above." But be this time their car had come by, an' up wid thim, an' off they dhruv. I'd ne'er ha' thought Patsy 'd say that; an' he did n't belike - - But it's on'y the truth if he did. A burthen? Bedad, I'm so. life, It's the quare thanks I'm givin' him now, to be starvin' the childher and wife. For I often considher a sayin' we have: "Whin it's little ye 've got, It's the hunger ye'll find at the botthom, if many dip spoons in your pot." But if wanst they were shut o' meself, an' the Agint 'ud wait for a bit, They might weather the worst o' the throuble, an' keep the ould roof o'er thim yit. But suppose they 're put out afther all, an' packed off to the An' I up away in the House, I might never so happin to hear; was a roon, Wid naught left save the rims o' four walls, that the weeds 'ud be coverin' soon; An' the bastes o' the field walkin' in; an' the hole where the hearth was filled Wid the briers; an' no thrace o' the shed that I helped me poor father to build, An' I but a slip of a lad, an' that plased to be handlin' the tools, I'most hammered the head off each nail that I dhruv. Och, it's boys that are fools. 'Tis sevin mile good into Westport; I never could thramp it so far, But Tim Daly dhrives there of a Friday; he 'll loan me a sate on his car. An' Friday's to-morra, ochone! so I'm near now to seein' me last past. I remimber the House goin' by it. It stands on a bit of a rise, Stone-black, lookin' over the lan', wid its windows all starin' like eyes; And it's lonesome an' sthrange I'll be feelin', wid ne'er a friend's face to behould; An' the days 'ill go dhreary an' slow. But I'm ould, plase God, I'm ould. THE WIDOW JOYCE'S CLOAK.1 (From "Strangers at Lisconnel.") STILL, although the Tinkers' name has become a byword among us through a long series of petty offences rather than any one flagrant crime, there is a notable misdeed on record against them, which has never been forgotten in the lapse of many years. It was perpetrated soon after the death of Mrs. Kilfoyle's mother, the Widow Joyce, an event which is but dimly recollected now at Lisconnel, as nearly half a century has gone by. She did not very long survive her husband, and he had left his roots behind in his little place at Clonmena, where, as we know, he had farmed not wisely but too well, and had been put out of it for his pains to expend his energy upon our oozy black sods and stark-white bowlders. But instead he moped about, fretting for his fair green fields, and few proudly cherished beasts, especially the little old Kerry cow. And at his funeral the neighbors said, "Ah, bedad, poor man, God help him, he niver held up his head agin from that good day to this." When Mrs. Joyce felt that it behooved her to settle her affairs, she found that the most important possession she had to dispose of was her large cloak. She had acquired it at the prosperous time of her marriage, and it was a very superior specimen of its kind, in dark-blue cloth being superfine, and its ample capes and capacious hood being double-lined and quilted and stitched in a way which I cannot pretend to describe, but which made it a most substantial and handsome garment. If Mrs. Joyce had been left entirely to her own choice in the matter, I think she would have bequeathed it to her younger daughter Theresa, notwithstanding that custom clearly designated Bessy Kilfoyle, the eldest of the family, as the heiress. For she said to herself that poor Bessy had her husband and children to consowl her, any way, but little Theresa, the crathur, had ne'er such a thing at all, and would n't have, not she, God love her. "And the back of me hand to some I could name." It seemed to her that to leave the child the cloak would be almost like keeping a warm wing spread over her in the cold wide world; and there was no fear that Bessy would take it amiss. But Theresa herself protested strongly against such a disposi tion, urging for one thing that sure she'd be lost in it entirely if ever she put it on; a not unfounded objection, as Theresa was 1 Copyright, 1895, by Dodd, Mead and Company. By permission. several sizes smaller than Bessy, and even she fell far short of her mother in stature and portliness. Theresa also said confidently with a sinking heart," But sure, anyhow, mother jewel, what matter about it? "Twill be all gone to houles and flitters and thraneens, and so it will, plase goodness, afore there's any talk of anybody else wearin' it except your own ould self." And she expressed much the same conviction one day to her nextdoor neighbor, old Biddy Ryan, to whom she had run in for the loan of a sup of sour milk, which Mrs. Joyce fancied. To Biddy's sincere regret she could offer Theresa barely a skimpy noggin of milk, and only a meagre shred of encouragement; and by way of eking out the latter with its sorry substitute, consolation, she said as she tilted the jug perpendicularly to extract its last drop: "Well, sure, me dear, I do be sayin' me prayers for her every sun goes over our heads that she might be left wid you this great while yet; 'deed, I do so. But ah, acushla, if we could be keepin' people that-a-way, would there be e'er a funeral iver goin' black on the road at all at all? I'm thinkin' there's scarce a one livin', and he as ould and foolish and little-good-for as you plase, but some crathur 'ill be grudgin' him to his grave, that's himself may be all the while wishin' he was in it. Or, morebetoken, how can we tell what quare ugly misfortin' thim that's took is took out of the road of, that we should be as good as biddin' thim stay till it comes to ruinate them? So it's prayin' away I am, honey," said old Biddy, whom Theresa could not help hating heart-sickly. "But like enough the Lord might know better than to be mindin' a word I say." And it seemed that He did; anyway, the day soon came when the heavy blue cloak passed into Mrs. Kilfoyle's possession. At that time it was clear, still autumn weather, with just a sprinkle of frost white on the wayside grass, like the wraith of belated moonlight, when the sun rose, and shimmering into rainbow stars by noon. But about a month later the winter swooped suddenly on Lisconnel: with wild winds and cold rain that made crystal-silver streaks down the purple of the great mountainheads peering in over our bogland. So one perishing Saturday Mrs. Kilfoyle made up her mind that she would wear her warm legacy on the bleak walk to Mass next morning, and reaching it down from where it was stored away among the rafters wrapped in an old sack, she shook it respectfully out of its straight-creased folds. As she did so she noticed that the binding of the hood had ripped in one place, and that the lining was fraying out, a mishap which should be promptly remedied before it spread any further. She was not a very expert needlewoman, and she thought she had better run over the way to consult Mrs. O'Driscoll, then a young matron, esteemed the handiest and most helpful person in Lisconnel. "It's the nathur of her to be settin' things straight wherever she goes," Mrs. Kilfoyle said to herself as she stood in her doorway waiting for the rain to clear off, and looking across the road to the sodden roof which sheltered her neighbor's head. It had long been lying low, vanquished by a trouble which even she could not set to rights, and some of the older people say that things have gone a little crookeder in Lisconnel ever since. The shower was a vicious one, with the sting of sleet and hail in its drops, pelted about by gusts that ruffled up the puddles into ripples, all set on end, like the feathers of a frightened hen. The hens themselves stood disconsolately sheltering under the bank, mostly on one leg, as if they preferred to keep up the slightest possible connection with such a very damp and disagreeable earth. You could not see far in any direction for the fluttering sheets of mist, and a stranger who had been coming along the road from Duffclane stepped out of them abruptly quite close to Mrs. Kilfoyle's door, before she knew that there was anybody near. He was a tall, elderly man, gaunt and grizzled, very ragged, and so miserable-looking that Mrs. Kilfoyle could have felt nothing but compassion for him had he not carried over his shoulder a bunch of shiny cans, which was to her mind as satisfactory a passport as a ticket of leave. For although these were yet rather early days at Lisconnel, the Tinkers had already begun to establish their reputation. So when he stopped in front of her and said, "Good-day, ma'am," she only replied distantly, "It's a hardy mornin',” and hoped he would move on. But he said, "It's cruel could, ma'am," and continued to stand looking at her with wide and woful eyes, in which she conjectured - erroneously, as it happened - hunger for warmth or food. Under these circumstances, what could be done by a woman who was conscious of owning a redly glowing hearth with a big black pot, fairly well filled, clucking and bobbing upon it? To possess such wealth as this, and think seriously of withholding a share from anybody who urges the incontestable claim of wanting it, is a mood altogether foreign |