back of his hand where it lay upon my hands; and in another instant a flood of tears came.

My uncle placed his other hand upon my head, and I felt it tremble as, in silence, he held it there.

After a while, when the rush of tears was stayed, he said in a low voice, "Dinny boy, ye were never thoughtless. Ye couldn't know what I chose to hide well from ye. Ye couldn't help, Dinny; and why, why then, should I try to rob ye of yer innocent enjoyment? And as I held it from ye for yer own good before, 'tis for yer own good now that I tell it to ye the night. Ye're a man now, and ye must know what ye have to face."

The words "Ye're a man now," aroused the drooping spirit within me, suddenly, and it braced itself. I lifted up my head, and sat erect, and looked my uncle in the eye. I said, in a calm voice that fell strangely on my own ear:

!

"Uncle Donal, tell me what's the worst ?" My uncle looked at me for a moment hesitatingly; but the next moment replied calmly:

"In five days more, Dinny-Hallowday-I'll be three years behind with the rent. I'm not able to pay it. I'm threatened that it'll be let run no longer. I was born within these walls, Dinny " -his voice was tremulous here" I've passed me life in them. I'm an old man now, and-and-" he paused while he braced himself with a long breath-" and, Dinny, it'll go hard on me to laive them forever and see you laive them."

I did not relax one muscle in my countenance, which was firm set. And I was all the more determined because I knew that Uncle Donal was with side glance, narrowly observing me. Yet I never can tell the effort it cost me; for those words cut through and through the heart within me.

When I mustered enough nerve to speak without betraying all I felt, I said:

"Uncle Donal!" I was looking into the fire again.

"Well, Dinny boy?" "I'm a man, now."

My uncle nodded his head. Then he said, rather soliloquizingly, “Ay, with a child's heart."

"A man," I repeated, with more firmness of voice, "and sthrong and able-thank God. In less than three weeks' time will be the hirin' market in Donegal. "I'll ask your blessin', uncle, and God's, and I'll tie a few articles in a handkerchief, and go with the boys to the hirin' market. I'll hire meself to the Pettigo man that gives me most. I'll work for ye, Uncle Donal, Get sparin's for the rent and, with God's help, I'll pay it yet. Ye'll never bid good-by to these walls, uncle, while I can help it."

My Uncle Donal's eyes grew moist as I spoke. "Dinny," he said when I had triumphantly finished, "Dinny-" and he placed a hand upon my head-" God 'ill bliss and prosper you yet. But-" his tone took on a stern firmness-"your father and mother's son 'ill never hire to a Pettigo man-'ill never stand up to be priced in a hirin' market within the bounds of Irelan'."

"Uncle Donal!" I remonstrated, " sure it isn't any disgrace to ask honest money for honest work -in Ireland more than anywhere else?"

Yet his eyes flashed with the fire of a pride that I could not then, and can not now, rightly understand. He said: "One of your father's or mother's people never stepped on the stones of a hirin' market; and, Dinny, while I live to prevent it you'll not be the first to do it. No!"

I felt confounded. I dropped my gaze, and reflected. After a minute my uncle laid a gentle touch on my shoulder and said, in tender tones,

Forgive me, Dinny. Forgive me. But ye'll not do it, Dinny-ye can't do it." After a while's thought I said,

"Then, uncle, there's one other thing for me." He looked into my eyes for a few moments, and then slightly inclined his head. " I suppose so," he said reluctantly.

"America," I said, with a voice that almost failed me.

" America," he repeated. "Yes."

But when it was said he buried his face in his

CHAPTER XXV

The KINDLY NEIGHBORS

N the very next morning Uncle Donal and
I set off early for Donegal, where, after in-

quiries regarding the ships that would be likely soon to sail for the States, we settled that I should go by the Cailín Donn,* a little schooner of one hundred and twenty tons, which would weigh anchor from the Green Islands in the second week of November.

On that night I went over to John Burns's, bringing with me the making of a suit which my uncle had bought for me in Donegal. There were many of the neighbors assembled there.

"Didn't I make a shuit for ye last Aisther?" John asked half in surprise, and half in reproach. "And sure ye don't main ye're goin' to get another made?"

I said, without raising my eyes to his face, "John, I am going away to America."

There was instantly a dead stop in the conversation that had been going on in the house. John pulled off his spectacles and looked at me in wonderment. He then said:

"What did ye say, chile?"

"I am going off to America on the Cailín Donn in a couple of weeks. It's time I was doing something to help my Uncle Donal. And there's nothing to be had in Ireland."

All present had turned on their seats, and were observing me intently-except Nuala. I noticed that she did not turn toward me, or move. Ellen Burns got off the bench where she was sewing, and came and stood beside me, and put an arm around my neck.

"Dinny," said she, "surely, it's only a joke of ye."

I lifted up my eyes till they met Ellen's tender glance, and I said:

"It's too true, Ellen."

She took away her arm then, and went back and sat upon the table.

"To Amiriky?" said John, who had his eyes all the time bent upon me. "To Amiriky!" He shook his head sadly. "And with your grand education, too, ye must go the road of all our poor boys-to Amiriky! Oh, Mhuire a's truagh!" "To Amiriky?" said the Widow's Pat. "Το Amiriky! Och, och, for you, Dinny!"

"Yes," said Toal a-Gallagher. "To Amiriky! To Amiriky! Them's the words that's on the lips of all our Irish boys and girls now; and them's the words their broken-hearted mothers and fathers, croon and caoine to themselves, with shakin' gray heads."