At any rate, it must be allowed that Mrs. Barry, after her husband’s death and her retirement, lived in such a way as to defy slander.  For whereas Bell Brady had been the gayest girl in the whole county of Wexford, with half the bachelors at her feet, and plenty of smiles and encouragement for every one of them, Bell Barry adopted a dignified reserve that almost amounted to pomposity, and was as starch as any Quakeress.  Many a man renewed his offers to the widow, who had been smitten by the charms of the spinster; but Mrs. Barry refused all offers of marriage, declaring that she lived now for her son only, and for the memory of her departed saint.

‘Saint forsooth!’ said ill-natured Mrs. Brady.

’Harry Barry was as big a sinner as ever was known; and ’tis notorious that he and Bell hated each other.  If she won’t marry now, depend on it, the artful woman has a husband in her eye for all that, and only waits until Lord Bagwig is a widower.’

And suppose she did, what then?  Was not the widow of a Barry fit to marry with any lord of England? and was it not always said that a woman was to restore the fortunes of the Barry family?  If my mother fancied that she was to be that woman, I think it was a perfectly justifiable notion on her part; for the Earl (my godfather) was always most attentive to her:  I never knew how deeply this notion of advancing my interests in the world had taken possession of mamma’s mind, until his Lordship’s marriage in the year ’57 with Miss Goldmore, the Indian nabob’s rich daughter.

Meanwhile we continued to reside at Barryville, and, considering the smallness of our income, kept up a wonderful state.  Of the half-dozen families that formed the congregation at Brady’s Town, there was not a single person whose appearance was so respectable as that of the widow, who, though she always dressed in mourning, in memory of her deceased husband, took care that her garments should be made so as to set off her handsome person to the greatest advantage; and, indeed, I think, spent six hours out of every day in the week in cutting, trimming, and altering them to the fashion.  She had the largest of hoops and the handsomest of furbelows, and once a month (under my Lord Bagwig’s cover) would come a letter from London containing the newest accounts of the fashions there.  Her complexion was so brilliant that she had no call to use rouge, as was the mode in those days.  No, she left red and white, she said (and hence the reader may imagine how the two ladies hated each other) to Madam Brady, whose yellow complexion no plaster could alter.  In a word, she was so accomplished a beauty, that all the women in the country took pattern by her, and the young fellows from ten miles round would ride over to Castle Brady church to have the sight of her.