“What do you say about the sign o’ money?” exclaimed Phelim, with a swagger.  “Maybe you’ll call that the sign o’ money!” he added, producing the ten guineas in gold.  The father and mother looked at it for a considerable time, then at each other, and shook their heads.

“Phelim!” said the father, solemnly.  “Phelim!” said the mother, awfully; and both shook their heads again.

“You wor never over-scrupulous,” the father proceeded, “an’ you know you have many little things to answer for, in the way of pickin’ up what didn’t belong to yourself.  I think, too, you’re not the same boy you wor afore you tuck to swearin’ the alibies.

“Faith, an’ I doubt I’ll haye to get some one to swear an alibi for myself soon,” Phelim replied.

“Why, blessed hour!” said Larry, “didn’t I often tell you never to join the boys in anything that might turn out a hangin’ matther?”

“If this is not a hangin’ matther,” said Phelim, “it’s something nearly as bad:  it’s a marryin’ matther.  Sure I deluded another since you seen me last.  Divil a word o’ lie in it.  I was clane fell in love wid this mornin’ about seven o’clock.”

“But how did you get the money, Phelim?”

“Why, from the youthful sprig that fell in love wid me.  Sure we’re to be ‘called’ in the Chapel on Sunday next.”

“Why thin now, Phelim!  An’ who is the young crathur? for in throth she must be young to go to give the money beforehand!”

“Murdher!” exclaimed Phelim, “what’s this for!  Was ever any one done as I am?  Who is she!  Why she’s—­oh, murdher, oh!—­she’s no other than—­hem—­divil a one else than Father O’Hara’s housekeeper, ould Biddy Doran!”

The mirth of the old couple was excessive.  The father laughed till he fell off his stool, and the mother till the tears ran down her cheeks.

“Death alive; ould man! but you’re very merry,” said Phelim.  “If you wor my age, an’ in such an’ amplush, you’d laugh on the wrong side o’ your mouth.  Maybe you’ll tarn your tune when you hear that she has a hundhre and twenty guineas.”

“An’ you’ll be rich, too,” said the father.  “The sprig an’ you will be rich!—­ha, ha, ha!”

“An’ the family they’ll have!” said the mother, in convulsions.

“Why, in regard o’ that,” said Phelim, rather nettled, “if all fails us, sure we can do as my father and you did:  kiss the Lucky Stone, an’ make a Station.”

“Phelim, aroon,” said the mother, seriously, “put it out o’ your head.  Sure you wouldn’t go to bring me a daughter-in-law oulder nor myself?”

“I’d as soon go over,” (* be transported) said Phelim; “or swing itself, before I’d marry sich a piece o’ desate.  Hard feelin’ to her! how she did me to my face!”

Phelim then entered into a long-visaged detail of the scene at Father O’Hara’s, dwelling bitterly on the alacrity with which the old housekeeper ensnared him in his own mesh.