Frank’s arrival among them gave a fresh impulse to their mirth and enjoyment.  His manners were highly agreeable, and his spirits buoyant almost to levity.  Notwithstanding the badness of his character in the opinion of the sober, steady, and respectable inhabitants of the parish, yet he was a favorite with the desolate and thoughtless, and with many who had not an opportunity of seeing him except in his most favorable aspect.  Whether he entertained on this occasion any latent design that might have induced him to assume a frankness of manner, and an appearance of good-humor, which he did not feel, it is difficult to determine.  Be this as it may, he made himself generally agreeable, saw that every one was comfortable, suggested an improvement in the arrangement of the seats, broke several jests on Bariry and Granua Waile—­which, however, were returned with interest—­and, in fact, acquitted himself so creditably, that his father whispered with a sigh to his mother—­“Alley, achora, wouldn’t we be the happy family if that misfortunate boy of ours was to be always the thing he appears to be?  God help him! the gommach, if he had sinse, and the fear o’ God before him, he’d not be sich a pace o’ desate to sthrangers, and such a divil’s limb wid ourselves:  but he’s young, an’ may see his evil coorses in time, wid the help o’ God.”

“Musha, may God grant it!” exclaimed his mother:  “a fine slip he is, if his heart ‘ud only turn to the right thoughts.  One can’t help feelin’ pride out o’ him, when they see him actin’ wid any kind o’ rason.”

The Irish dance, like every other assembly composed of Irishmen and Irishwomen, presents the spectators with those traits which enter into our conception of rollicking fun and broad humor.  The very arrangements are laughable; and when joined to the eccentric strains of some blind fiddler like Barny Dhal, to the grotesque and caricaturish faces of the men, and the modest, but evidently arch and laughter-loving countenances of the females, they cannot fail to impress an observing mind with the obvious truth, that a nation of people so thoughtless and easily directed from the serious and useful pursuits of life to such scenes, can seldom be industrious and wealthy, nor, despite their mirth and humor, a happy people.

The barn in which they danced on this occasion was a large one.  Around the walls were placed as many seats as could be spared from the neighbors’ houses; these were eked out by sacks of corn laid length-wise, logs of round timber, old creels, iron pots with their bottoms turned up, and some of them in their usual position.  On these were the youngsters seated, many of the “boys” with their sweethearts on their knees, the arms of the fair ones lovingly around their necks; and, on the contrary many of the young women with their bachelors on their laps, their own necks also gallantly encircled by the arms of their admirers.  Up in a corner sat Barny, surrounded by the seniors of the village, sawing the fiddle with indefatigable vigor, and leading the conversation with equal spirit.  Indeed, his laugh was the loudest, and his joke the best; whilst, ever and anon, his music became perfectly furious—­that is to say, when he rasped the fiddle with a desperate effort “to overtake the dancers,” from whom, in the heat of the conversation, he had unwittingly lagged behind.