“What was their object, have you learned, in attacking O’Driscol’s place?”

“Well, then, I didn’t hear; but anyhow, they say that a new workin’ boy of O’Driscol’s, that dogged them up beyant Darby Hourigan’s, was wounded by them, along with Darby himself, in regard, of his having joined the young fellow in dodgin’ afther them.”

“Are they seriously hurt?” asked John.

“Throth that’s more than I can say, but I hope they’re not, poor fellows; at any rate, I’m sure Mr. O’Driscol will have them well taken care of till they’re recovered.”

“Certainly,” observed the proctor, “if he thinks it his duty he will:  my friend O’Driscol will do what he conceives to be right.”

The pedlar nodded significantly, and honored the observation with, a broad grin.  “Well, sir,” said he, changing the conversation, “he may do for that as he likes, but I must look to number one.  Come, ladies—­and, by the way, where’s my favorite, Miss Julia—­from you?”

“She’s not quite well this morning, Cannie,” said her mother; “she has a slight headache, I believe.”

“Well, Miss Mary, then?  Any purchases to-day, Miss Mary?”

“Not to-day, Cannie—­the next time, perhaps.”

“Cannie,” said Purcel, “you praised your razors very highly at your last visit;—­have you a good case this morning?”

“Haven’t I, sir?  Wait till you see them.”

He then produced a case, which the proctor purchased, and thus closed his sales for that day.

The pedlar, however, notwithstanding that his commercial transactions had been concluded, seemed somehow in no hurry.  On the contrary, he took up his pack and exclaimed, “I must go back to the kitchen, till I see what can be done there in the way of business; hearin’ that you were finishin’ breakfast, I hurried up here to sell my goods and have my chat.”

“Very well, Cannie,” said the proctor, “try the folks below, and success to you!”

The pedlar once more sought the kitchen, where he lingered in fact more like a man who seemed fatigued than otherwise, inasmuch as his eyes occasionally closed, and his head nodded, in spite of him.  He kept, however, constantly watching and peeping into the yard and lawn from time to time, as if he expected to see somebody.  At length he got tip and was about to go, when he said to Letty Lenehan:—­“Ah, thin, Letty, afore I go I’d give a trifle that Miss Julia ’ud see a bracelet I got since I was here last; divil sich a beauty ever was seen.”

“Very well, Cannie, I’ll tell her if you wish.”

“Then, Letty, may it rain honeycombs an you, an’ do.  I’ll go round to the hall-door, ‘say, and she can look at them there; an’ see, Letty, say the sorra foot I’ll go from the place till she sees it:  that it’ll be worth her while; and that if she knew how I got it, she’d fly—­if she had wings—­to get a glimpse of it.”

He had not been more than a minute or two at the hall-door when Julia, struck by the earnestness of the man’s language, which lost nothing in the transmission, made her appearance.