“Ah, Mr. Clinton, don’t, if you please.  That’s a subject you may respect yet as much as I do; but regarding my opinion of the two beauties in question, why was it solicited, Mr. Hycy?” he added, turning to that worthy gentlemen.

“Faith, I’m not able to say, most learned Philomath; only, is it true that Bryan, the clodhopper, has matrimonial designs upon the fair daughter of the regal Cavanagh?”

“Sic vult fama, Mr. Hycy, upon condition that a certain accomplished young gentleman, whose surname commences with the second letter of the alphabet, won’t offer—­for in that case, it is affirmed, that the clodhopper should travel.  By the way, Mr. Clinton, I met your uncle and Mr. Fethertonge riding up towards Ahadarra this morning.”

“Indeed!” exclaimed both; and as they spoke, each cast a look of inquiry at the other.

“What could bring them to Ahadarra, gentlemen?” asked Finigan, in a tone of voice which rendered it a nice point to determine whether it was a simple love of knowledge that induced him to put the question, or some other motive that might have lain within a kind of ironical gravity that accompanied it.

“Why, I suppose a pair of good horses,” replied Hycy, “and their own inclination.”

“It was not the last, at all events,” said Finigan, “that ever brought a thief to the gallows—­ha! ha! ha! we must be facetious sometimes, Mr. Hycy.”

“You appear to enjoy that joke, Mr. Finigan,” said Hycy, rather tartly.

“Faith,” replied Finigan, “it’s a joke that very few do enjoy, I think.”

“What is?”

“Why, the gallows, sir—­ha! ha! ha! but don’t forget the O if you plaise—­ever and always the big O before Finigan—­ha! ha! ha!”

“Come, Clinton,” said Hycy, “move on a little.  D—­n that fellow!” he cried—­“he’s a sneering scoundrel; and I’m half inclined to think he has more in him than one would be apt to give him credit for.”

“By the way, what could the visit to Ahadarra mean?” asked Clinton.  “Do you know anything about it, Hycy?”

“Not about this; but it is very likely that I shall cause them, or one of them at least, to visit it on some other occasion ere long; and that’s all I can say now.  Curse that keening, what a barbarous practice it is!’

“I think not,” said the other; “on the contrary, I am of opinion that there’s something strikingly wild and poetical in it something that argues us Irish to be a people of deep feeling and strong imagination:  two of the highest gifts of intellect.”

“All stuff,” replied the accomplished Hycy, who, among his other excellent qualities, could never afford to speak a good word to his country Or her people.  “All stuff and barbarous howling that we learned from the wolves when we had them in Ireland.  Here we are at the graveyard.”

“Hycy,” said his friend, “it never occurred to me to thing of asking what religion you believe in.”