And so the affair, like one of those medleys of our Irish melodies arranged by poor M. Jullien, starting with a martial air, breathing turf and thunder, fire and sword, went off imperceptibly into a pathetic and amorous strain.  Father Roach, still officiating as internuncio, found the dowager less and less impracticable, and at length a treaty was happily concluded.  The captive came forth to wear thenceforward those lighter chains only, which are forged by Hymen and wreathed with roses; and the lady applied to his old promissory notes the torch of love, which in a moment reduced them to ashes.  And here, at the hermitage of our jolly Chapelizod priest—­for bride and bridegroom were alike of the ’ancient faith’—­the treaty was ratified, and the bagpipe and the bridegroom, in tremendous unison, splitting the rafters with ’Hymen, Hymen, O Hymenoee!’

In the midst of this festive celebration, his reverence was summoned to the hall, already perfumed with the incense of the geese, the onions, the bacon browned at the kitchen-fire, and various other delicacies, toned and enriched by the vapours that exhaled from the little bottle of punch which, in consideration of his fatigues, stood by the elbow of the piper.

When the holy man had heard Moggy’s tale, he scratched his tonsure and looked, I must say, confoundedly bored.

’Now, Moggy, my child, don’t you see, acushla, ’tisn’t to me you should ha’ come; I’m here, my dear, engaged,’ and he dried his moist and rubicund countenance, ’in one of the sacred offices iv the Church, the sacrament, my dear, iv’—­here Mahony and the piper struck up again in so loud a key in the parlour, that as Moggy afterwards observed, ’they could not hear their own ears,’ and the conclusion of the sentence was overwhelmed in, ‘Many’s the bottle I cracked in my time.’  So his reverence impatiently beckoned to the hall-door, which he opened, and on the steps, where he was able to make himself audible, he explained the nature of his present engagement, and referred her to Doctor Toole.  Assured, however, that he was in Dublin, he scratched his tonsure once more.

‘The divil burn the lot o’ them, my dear, an’ purty evenin’ they chose for their vagaries—­an’ law papers too, you say, an’ an attorney into the bargain—­there’s no influence you can bring to bear on them fellows.  If ‘twas another man, an’ a couple more at his back, myself an’ Pat Moran ‘id wallop them out of the house, an’ into the river, be gannies; as aisy as say an ave.’

The illustration, it occurred to him, might possibly strike Moggy as irreverent, and the worthy father paused, and, with upturned eyes, murmured a Latin ejaculation, crossing himself; and having thus reasserted his clerical character, he proceeded to demonstrate the uselessness of his going.