This night was an eventful one.  The course of our narrative brings us and our readers to the house of Captain Smellpriest, who had for his next-door neighbor the stalwart curate of the parish, the Rev. Samson Strong, to whom some allusion has been I already made in these pages.  Now the difference between Smellpriest and Whitecraft was this—­Smellpriest was not a magistrate, as Whitecraft was, and in his priest-hunting expeditions only acted upon warrants issued by some bigoted and persecuting magistrate or other who lived in the district.  But as his propensity to hunt those unfortunate persons was known, the execution of the warrants was almost in every instance entrusted to his hands.  It was not so with Sir Robert, who, being himself a magistrate, might be said to have been in the position at once of judge and executioner.  At all events, the race of blood was pretty equal between them, so far as the clergy was concerned; but in general enmity to the Catholic community at large, Whitecraft was far more cruel and comprehensive in his vengeance.  It is indeed an observation founded upon truth and experience, that in all creeds, in proportion to his ignorance and bigotry, so is the violence of the persecutor.  Whitecraft, the self-constituted champion of Protestantism, had about as much religion as Satan himself—­or indeed less, for we are told that he believes and trembles, while Whitecraft, on the contrary, neither believed nor trembled.  But if he did not fear God, he certainly feared man, and on the night in question went home with as craven a heart—­thanks to Lanigan—­as ever beat in a coward’s bosom.  Smellpriest, however, differed from Whitecraft in many points; he was brave, though cruel, and addicted to deep potations.  Whitecraft, it is true, drank more deeply still than he did; but, by some idiosyncrasy of stomach or constitution, it had no more effect upon him than it had upon the cask from which it had been drawn, unless, indeed, to reduce him to greater sobriety and sharpen his prejudices.

Be this as it may, the Rev. Samson Strong made his appearance in Smellpriest’s house with a warrant, or something in the shape of one, which he placed in the gallant captain’s hands, who was drunk.

“What’s this, oh, Samson the Strong? said Smellpriest, laughing and hiccuping both at the same time.

“It’s a hunt, my dear friend.  One of those priests of Baal has united in unholy bands a Protestant subject with a subject of the harlot of abominations.”

“Samson, my buck,” said Smellpriest, “I hope this Popish priest of yours will not turn out to be a wild-goose.  You know you have sent me upon many a wild-goose chase before; in—­in—­in fact, you nev—­never sent me upon any other.  You’re a blockhead, oh, divine Samson; and that—­that thick head of yours would flatten a cannon-ball.  But what is it?—­an intermarriage between the two P’s—­Popish and Protestant?”