“‘I b’lieve,’ said Mick, with a faint smile, ’that you’re not very fond of the priests, Mr. Johnston; but if you knew the power they possess as well as I do, you wouldn’t spake of them so bad, anyhow.’

“‘Me fond of them!’ replied the other;’ ’why, man, they’re a set of the most gluttonous, black-looking hypocrites that ever walked on neat’s leather; and ought to be hunted out of the country—­hunted out of the country, by the light of day! every one of them; for they do nothing but egg up the people against the Protestants.’

“‘God help you, Mr. Johnston,’ replied the invalid, ’I pity you from my heart for the opinion you hould about them.  I suppose if you were sthruck dead on the spot wid a blast from the fairies, that you think a priest couldn’t cure you by one word’s spaking?’

“‘Cure me!’ said Vengeance, with a laugh of disdain; ’by the light of day! if I caught one of them curing me, I’d give him the purtiest chase you ever saw in your life, across the hills.’

“‘Don’t you know,’ said Mick, ’that priest Dannelly cured Bob Beaty of the falling sickness—­until he broke the vow that was laid upon him, of not going into a church, and the minute he crossed the church-door, didn’t he dhrop down as bad as ever—­and what could the minister do for him?’

“‘And don’t you know,’ rejoined Vengeance, ’that that’s all a parcel of the most lying stuff possible; lies—­lies—­all lies—­and vagabondism?  Why, Mick, you Papishes worship the priests; you think they can bring you to heaven at a word.  By the light of day, they must have good sport laughing at you, when they get among one another.  Why don’t they teach you and give you the Bible to read, the ribelly rascals? but they’re afraid you’d know too much then.’

“‘Well, Mr. Johnston,’ said Mick, ’I b’lieve you’ll never have a good opinion of them, at any rate.’

“‘Ay, when the sky falls,’ replied Vengeance; ’but you’re now on your death bed, and why don’t you pitch them to ould Nick, and get a Bible?  Get a Bible, man; there’s a pair of them in my house, that’s never used at all—­except my mother’s, and she’s at it night and day.  I’ll send one of them down to you:  turn yourself to God—­to your Redeemer, that died on the mount of Jehosha-phat, or somewhere about Jerusalem, for your sins—­and don’t go out of the world from the hand of a rascally priest, with a band about your eyes, as if you were at blind-man’s-buff, for, by the light of day, you’re as blind as a bat in a religious way.’

“‘There’s no use in sending me a Bible,’ replied the invalid, ’for I can’t read it:  but, whatever you may think, I’m very willing to lave my salvation with my priest.’

“‘Why, man,’ observed Vengeance, ’I thought you were going to have sense at last, and that you sent for me to give you some spiritual consolation.’

“‘No, sir,’ replied Mick; ‘I have two or three words to spake to you.’

“’Come, come, Mick, now that we’re on a spiritual subject, I’ll hear nothing from you till I try whether it’s possible to give you a trute insight into religion.  Stop, now, and let us lay our heads together, that we may make out something of a dacenter creed for you to believe in than the one you profess.  Tell me the truth, do you believe in the priests?’