“Divil a betther, Mogue,” replied Hourigan, with a significant scowl, and “it’s we ourselves that’ll be sure to take it some fine night.”

“Night or day,” replied Mogue, “it’s always right to be doin’ good, whether we sarve our country or religion.  God prosper yez, at all events, and grant you success in your endeavors, an’ that’s the worst I wish you!  There now, Masther John’s in the office, ready an’ willin’ to give sich o’ yez a resate in full as will—­desarve it.”

The situation in which the parties stood, during this dialogue, was at the rear of the premises into which the proctor’s office opened, and where the country people were always desired to wait.  They stood at the end of the stable, adjoining a wall almost eight feet high, on the other side of which was the pig-sty.  Here, whilst the conversation just detailed went forward, stood a pretty, plump-looking, country-girl, one of the female servants of the proctor’s establishment, named Letty Lenehan.  She had come to feed the pigs, just in time to catch the greater portion of their conversation; and, as she possessed a tolerably clear insight into Mogue’s character, she was by no means ignorant of certain illusions made in it, although she unquestionably did not comprehend its full drift.  We have said that this girl understood his character very well, and scarcely any one had a better right or greater opportunities of doing so.  Mogue, in fact, was in love with her, or at least, pretended to be so; but, whether he was or not, one thing we write as certain, that he most implicitly believed her to be so with himself.  Letty was a well-tempered, faithful girl, honest and conscientious, but not without a considerable relish for humor, and with more than ordinary talents for carrying on either a practical joke or any other piece of harmless humbug, a faculty in which she was ably supported by a fellow-servant of a very different description from Mogue, named Jerry Joyce.  Joyce, in fact, was not merely a strong contrast to Mogue, but his very reverse in almost every point of his character.  He was open and artless in the opinion of many, almost to folly; but, under this apparent thoughtlessness, there existed a fund of good sense, excellent feeling, and quickness of penetration, for which the world gave him no credit, or at least but very little.

Jerry and Letty, therefore, between whom a real affection subsisted, were in the habit of amusing themselves, whenever they could do so without discovery, at Mogue’s expense.  Such, then, was the relative position of these parties at the present stage of our narrative.