“This is very wrong of you, Hanna,” said her sister; “out of affection and pity to them, you ought to endeavor to act otherwise.  They have enough, an’ to much, to feel, without your setting them example; and, Dora dear, I thought you had more courage than you have.  All this is only grieving and disturbing your mother; an’ I hope that, for her sake, you’ll both avoid it.  I know it’s hard to do so, but it’s the difficulty and the trial that calls upon us to have strength, otherwise what are we better than them that we’d condemn or think little of for their own weakness.”

The truth and moral force of the words, and the firmness of manner that marked Kathleen as she spoke, were immediately successful.  The grief of the two girls was at once hushed; and, after a slight pause, Mrs. M’Mahon called Kathleen to her.

“Dear Kathleen,” she said, “I did hope to see the day when you’d be one of my own family, but it’s not the will of God, it appears, that I should; however, may His will be done!  I hope still that day will come, an’ that your friends won’t have any longer an objection to your marriage wid Bryan.  I am his mother, an’ no one has a better right to know his heart an’ his temper, an’ I can say, upon my dyin’ bed, that a better heart an’ a better temper never was in man.  I believe, Kathleen, it was never known that a good son ever made a bad husband.  However, if it’s God’s will to bring you together, He will, and if it isn’t, you must only bear it patiently.”

Bryan was silent, but his eye, from time to time, turned with a long glance of love and sorrow upon Kathleen, whose complexion became pale and red by turns.  At length Dora, after her mother had concluded, went over to Kathleen, and putting her arms around her neck, exclaimed, “Oh! mother dear, something tells me that Kathleen will be my sisther yet, an’ if you’d ask her to promise—­”

Kathleen looked down upon the beautiful and expressive features of the affectionate girl, and gently raising her hand she placed it upon Dora’s lips, in order to prevent the completion of the sentence.  On doing so she received a sorrowful glance of deep and imploring entreaty from Bryan, which she returned with another that seemed to reprove him for doubting her affection, or supposing that such a promise was even necessary.  “No, Dora dear,” she said, “I could make no promise without the knowledge of my father and mother, or contrary to their wishes; but did you think, darling, that such a thing was necessary?” She kissed the sweet girl as she spoke, and Dora felt a tear on her cheek that was not her own.

Mrs. M’Mahon had been looking with a kind of mournful admiration upon Kathleen during this little incident, and then proceeded.  “She says what is right and true; and it would be wrong, my poor child, to ask her to give such a promise.  Bryan, thry an’ be worthy of that girl—­oh, do! an’ if you ever get her, you’ll have raison to thank God for one of the best gifts He ever gave to man.  Hanna, come here—­come to me—­let me put my hand upon your head.  May my blessin’ and God’s blessin’ rest upon you for ever more.  There now, be stout, acushla machree.”  Hanna kissed her again, but her grief was silent; and Dora, fearing she might not be able to restrain it, took her away.