“Good morrow!”

“Good morrow mornin’ to you!”

“Arrah what Age may you be, neighbor?”

Now the correct words were, “What Age are we in?” (* This order or throng of the Ages is taken from Pastorini) but they were often slightly changed, sometimes through ignorance and sometimes from design, as in the latter case less liable to remark when addressed to persons not up.

“In the end of the Fifth,” was the reply.

“An’ if you wor shakin’ hands wid a friend, how would you do it?  Or stay—­all’s right so far—­but give us a grip of your cham ahas (right hand).”

Flanagan, who apprehended pursuit, was too cautious to trust himself within reach of any one coming from the direction in which the Bodagh lived.  He made no reply, therefore, to this, but urged his horse forward, and attempted to get clear of his catechist.

“Dhar Dhegh! it’s Flanagan,” said a voice which was that of Alick Nulty; and the next moment the equestrian was stretched in the mud, by a heavy blow from the but of a carbine.  Nearly a score of men were immediately about him; for the party he met on his return were the Bodagh’s son, his servants, and such of the cottiers as lived near enough to be called up to the rescue.  On finding himself secured, he lost all presence of mind, and almost all consciousness of his situation.

“I’m gone,” said he; “I’m a lost man; all Europe can’t save my life.  Don’t kill me, boys; don’t kill me; I’ll go wid yez quietly—­only, if I am to die, let me die by the laws of the land.”

“The laws of the land?” said John O’Brien; “oh, little, Bartle Flanagan, you respected them.  You needn’ be alarmed now—­you are safe here—­to the laws of the land we will leave you; and by them you must stand or fall.”

Bartle Flanagan, we need scarcely say, was well guarded until a posse of constables should arrive to take him into custody.  But, in the mean time, a large and increasing party sat up in the house of the worthy Bodagh; for the neighbors had been alarmed, and came flocking to his aid.  ’Tis true, the danger was now over; but the kind Bodagh, thankful in his heart to the Almighty for the escape of his daughter, would not let them go without first partaking of his hospitality.  His wife, too, for the same reason, was in a flutter of delight; and as her heart was as Irish as her husband’s, and consequently as hospitable, so did she stir about, and work, and order right and left until abundant refreshments were smoking on the table.  Nor was the gentle and melancholy Una herself, now that the snake was at all events scotched, averse to show herself among them—­for so they would have it.  Biddy Nulty had washed her face; and, notwithstanding the poultice of stirabout which her mistress with her own hands applied to her wound, she really was the most interesting person present, in consequence of her heroism during the recent outrage.  After a glass of punch had gone round, she waxed inveterately eloquent, indeed, so much so that the mourner, the colleen dhas dhun, herself was more than once forced to smile, and in some instances fairly to laugh at the odd grotesque spirit of her descriptions.