The squire then approached our under-gardener, and accosted him,

“Well, my good fellow, so you understand gardening?”

“A little, your haner,” replied the other, respectfully touching his hat, or caubeen rather.

“Are you a native of this neighborhood?”

“No, your haner.  I’m fwaither up—­from Westport, your haner.”

“Who were you engaged with last?”

“I wasn’t engaged, shir—­it was only job-work I was able to do—­the health wasn’t gud wid me.”

“Have you no better clothes than these?”

“You see all that I have on me, shir.”

“Well, come, I’ll give you the price of a suit rather than see such a scarecrow in my garden.”

“I couldn’t take it, shir.”

“The devil you couldn’t!  Why not, man?”

“Bekaise, shir, I’m under pinance.”

“Well, why don’t you shave?”

“I can’t, shir, for de same raison.”

“Pooh, pooh! what the devil did you do that they put such a penance on you.”

“Why, I runned away wit’ a young woman, shir.”

“Upon my soul you’re a devilish likely fellow to run away with a young woman, and a capital taste she must have had to go with you; but perhaps you took her away by violence, eh?”

“No, slur; she was willin’ enough to come; but her fadher wouldn’t consint, and so we made off wit’ ourselves.”

This was a topic on which the squire, for obvious reasons, did not like to press him.  It was in fact a sore subject, and, accordingly, he changed it.

“I suppose you have been about the country a good deal?”

“I have, indeed, your haner.”

“Did you ever happen to hear of, or to meet with, a person called Reilly?”

“Often, shir; met many o’ dem.”

“Oh, but I mean the scoundrel called Willy Reilly.”

“Is dat him dat left the country, shir?”

“Why, how do you know that he has left the country?”

“I don’t know myself, shir; but dat de people does be sayhi’ it.  Dey say dat himself and wan of our bishops went to France togither”

The squire seemed to breathe more freely as he said, in a low soliloquy, “I’m devilish glad of it; for, after all, it would go against my heart to hang the fellow.”

“Well,” he said aloud, “so he’s gone to France?”

“So de people does be sayin, shir.”

“Well, tell me—­do you know a gentleman called Sir Robert Whitecraft?”

“Is dat him, shir, dat keeps de misses privately?”

“How do you know that he keeps misses privately?”

“Fwhy, shir, dey say his last one was a Miss Herbert, and dat she had a young one by him, and dat she was an Englishwoman.  It isn’t ginerally known, I believe, shir, but dey do be sayin’ dat she was brought to bed in de cottage of some bad woman named Mary Mahon, dat does be on de lookout to get sweethearts for him.”

“There’s five thirteens for you, and I wish to God, my good fellow, that you would allow yourself to be put in better feathers.”