“No, yez don’t fool Larry McManus agin!  Yez are a mane, cold light with all yer blinkin’, and no fire beneath to give ‘im the good uv a cup o’ tay or put a warm heart in ’im!  Two nights agone ‘twas suspicion o’ rats kep’ me from shlapin’, yesternight ‘twas thought o’ what wud become of poor Oireland (Mary rest her) had we schnakes there ter fill the drames o’ nights loike they do here whin a man’s a drap o’er full o’ comfort.  ‘Tis a good roof above!  Heth, thin, had I a whisp o’ straw and a bite, wid this moonlight fer company, I’d not shog from out this the night to be King!

“Saints! but there’s a dog beyant the bark!” he cried a minute after, as the pup crept over to him and began to be friendly,—­“I wonder is a mon sinsible to go to trustin’ the loight o’ any moon that shines full on a pitch-black noight whin ‘tis rainin’?  Och hone! but me stomach’s that empty, gin I don’t put on me shoes me lungs’ll lake trou the soles o’ me fate, and gin I do, me shoes they’re that sopped, I’ll cough them up—­o-whurra-r-a! whurra-a! but will I iver see Old Oireland agin,—­I don’t know!”

Bart shut off the light, slipped on his shoes, and drawing a coat over his pajamas lighted the oil stable lantern, hung it with its back toward me, on a long hook that reached down from one of the rafters, and bore down upon Larry, whose face was instantly wreathed in puckered smiles at the sight of a fellow-human who, though big, evidently had no intention of being aggressive.

“Well, Larry McManus,” said Bart, cheerfully, “how came you in this barn so far away from Oireland a night like this?”

“Seein’ as yer another gintleman o’ the road in the same ploice, what more loike than the misfortune’s the same?” replied he, lengthening his lower lip and stretching his stubby chin, which he scratched cautiously.  Then, as he raised his eyes to Bart’s, he evidently read something in his general air, touselled and tanned as he was, that shifted his opinion at least one notch.

“Maybe, sor, you’re an actor mon, sor, that didn’t suit the folks in the town beyant, sor, but I’d take it as praise, so I would, for shure they’re but pigs there,—­I couldn’t stop wid thim meself!  Thin agin, mayhap yer jest a plain gintleman, a bit belated, as it were,—­a little belated on the way home, sor,—­loike me, sor, that wus moinded to be in Kildare, sor, come May-day, and blessed Peter’s day’s nigh come about an’ I’m here yit!”

“You are getting on the right scent, Larry,” said Bart, struggling with laughter, and yet, as he said after, not wishing possibly to huff this curious person.  “I hope I’m a gentleman, but I’m not tramping about; this is my barn, in which my wife and I are sleeping, so if I were you, I wouldn’t take off that shirt until I can find you a dry one!”