’I have made none, sir; but, if you urge me, I can only say that, if he has all these good qualities, it is to be regretted that he does not look and speak a little more like a gentleman.’

’A gentleman! he is as much a gentleman as any of your formal prigs—­not the exact Cambridge cut, maybe.  Curse your English education!  ’Twas none of my advice.  I suppose you mean to take after your mother in the notion that nothing can be good, or genteel, but what’s English.’

’Far from it, sir; I assure you, I am as warm a friend to Ireland as your heart could wish.  You will have no reason, in that respect at least, nor, I hope, in any other, to curse my English education; and, if my gratitude and affection can avail, you shall never regret the kindness and liberality with which you have, I fear, distressed yourself to afford me the means of becoming all that a British nobleman ought to be.’

‘Gad! you distress me now!’ said Lord Clonbrony, ’and I didn’t expect it, or I wouldn’t make a fool of myself this way,’ added he, ashamed of his emotion, and whiffling it off.  ’You have an Irish heart, that I see, which no education can spoil.  But you must like Terry.  I’ll give you time, as he said to me, when first he taught me to like usquebaugh.  Good morning to you!’

Whilst Lady Clonbrony, in consequence of her residence in London, had become more of a fine lady, Lord Clonbrony, since he left Ireland, had become less of a gentleman.  Lady Clonbrony, born an Englishwoman, disclaiming and disencumbering herself of all the Irish in town, had, by giving splendid entertainments, at an enormous expense, made her way into a certain set of fashionable company.  But Lord Clonbrony, who was somebody in Ireland, who was a great person in Dublin, found himself nobody in England, a mere cipher in London, Looked down upon by the fine people with whom his lady associated, and heartily weary of them, he retreated from them altogether, and sought entertainment and self-complacency in society beneath him—­indeed, both in rank and education, but in which he had the satisfaction of feeling himself the first person in company.  Of these associates, the first in talents, and in jovial profligacy, was Sir Terence O’Fay—­a man of low extraction, who had been knighted by an Irish lord-lieutenant in some convivial frolic.  No one could tell a good story, or sing a good song better than Sir Terence; he exaggerated his native brogue, and his natural propensity to blunder, caring little whether the company laughed at him or with him, provided they laughed.  ‘Live and laugh—­laugh and live,’ was his motto; and certainly he lived on laughing, as well as many better men can contrive to live on a thousand a year.

Lord Clonbrony brought Sir Terence home with him next day to introduce him to Lord Colambre; and it happened that on this occasion Terence appeared to peculiar disadvantage, because, like many other people, ’Il gatoit l’esprit qu’il avoit en voulant avoir celui qu’il n’avoit pas.’