“I have applied to you, sir,” he proceeded, “rather than to any other of the neighboring gentlemen, because I think this friendless lad has a peculiar claim upon any good offices you could render him.”

“A claim upon me!  How is that, Mr. O’Brien?”

“The boy, sir, is not a native of this province.  His father was formerly a tenant of yours, a man, as I have reason to believe, remarkable for good conduct and industry.  It appears that his circumstances, so long as he was your tenant, were those of a comfortable independent farmer.  If the story which his son relates be true—­and I, for one, believe it—­his family have been dealt with in a manner unusually cruel and iniquitous.  Your present agent, Colonel, who is known in his own neighborhood by the nickname of Yellow Sam, thrust him out of hia farm, when his wife was sick, for the purpose of putting into it a man who had married his illegitimate daughter.  If this be found a correct account of the transaction, I have no hesitation in saying, that you, Colonel B------, as a gentleman of honor and humanity, will investigate the conduct of your agent, and see justice done to an honest man, who must have been oppressed in your name, and under color of your authority.”

“If my agent has dared to be unjust to a worthy tenant,” said the Colonel, “in order to provide for his bastard, by my sacred honor, he shall cease to be an agent of mine!  I admit, certainly, that from some circumstances which transpired a few years ago, I have reason to suspect his integrity.  That, to be sure, was only so far as he and I were concerned; but, on the other hand, during one or two visits I made to the estate which he manages, I heard the tenants thank and praise him with much gratitude, and all that sort of thing.  There was ’Thank your honor!’—­’Long may you reign over us, sir!’—­and, ’Oh, Colonel, you’ve a mighty good man to your agent!’ and so forth.  I do not think, Mr. O’Brien, that he has acted so harshly, or that he would dare to do it.  Upon my honor, I heard those warm expressions of gratitude from the lips of the tenants themselves.”

“If you knew the people in general, Colonel, as well as I do,” replied the curate, “you would admit, that such expressions are often either cuttingly ironical, or the result of fear.  You will always find, sir, that the independent portion of the people have least of this forced dissimulation among them.  A dishonest and inhuman agent has in his own hands the irresponsible power of harassing and oppressing the tenantry under him.  The class most hateful to the people are those low wretches who spring up from nothing into wealth, accumulated by dishonesty and rapacity.  They are proud, overbearing, and jealous, even to vindictiveness, of the least want of respect.  It is to such upstarts that the poorer classes are externally most civil; but it is also such persons whom they most hate and abhor.  They flatter them to their faces, ’tis true even to nausea; but they seldom spare them in their absence.  Of this very class, I believe, is your agent, Yellow Sam; so that any favorable expressions you may have heard from your tenantry towards him, were most probably the result of dissimulation and fear.  Besides, sir, here is a testimonial from M’Evoy’s parish priest, in which his father is spoken of as an honest, moral, and industrious man.”