‘I beg ten thousand pardons!’ cried he, as he came up, scarcely out of breath.  ’I declare I forgot you, I could not help it, when I saw them at a check !’

‘You feel for the hunter as I do for the fox,’ said Albinia.  ’Is yours one of the great hunting neighbourhoods?’

‘That it is!’ he cried.  ’My grandfather had the grand stud!  He and his seven sons were out three times in the week, and there was a mount for whoever wanted it!’

‘And this generation is not behind the last?’

‘Ah! and why would it be?’ exclaimed the boy, the last remnant of English pronunciation forsaking him.  ’My Uncle Connel has the best mare on this side the bridge of Athlone!  I mean that side.’

‘And how is it with you?’ asked Albinia.

’We’ve got no horses—­that is, except my father’s mare, and the colt, and Fir Darrig—­the swish-tailed pony—­and the blind donkey that brings in the turf.  So we younger ones mostly go hunting on foot; and after all I believe that’s the best sport.  Bryan always comes in before any of the horses, and we all think it a shame if we don’t!’

’I see where you learnt the swiftness of foot that was so useful last July,’ said Albinia.

‘That? oh! but Bryan would have been up long before me,’ said Ulick.  ’He’d have made for the lock, not the gate!  You should see what sport we have when the fox takes to the Corrig Dearg up among the rocks—­and little Rosie upon Fir Darrig, with her hair upon the wind, and her colour like the morning cloud, glancing in and out among the rocks like the fairy of the glen.  There are those that think her the best part of the hunt; they say the English officers at Ochlochtimore would never think it worth coming out but for her.  I don’t believe that, you know,’ he added, laughing, ’though I like to fetch a rise out of Ulick at the great house by telling him of it.’

‘How old is she?’

’Fifteen last April, and she is like an April wind, when it comes warm and frolicking over the sea!  So wild and free, and yet so gentle and soft!  Ellen and Mary are grave and steady, and work hard--every stitch of my stockings was poor Mary’s knitting, except what poor old Peggy would send up for a compliment; but Rosie—­I don’t think she does a thing but sing, and ride, and row the boat, and keep the house alive!  My mother shakes her head, but I don’t know what she’ll say when she gets my aunt’s letter.  My Aunt Goldsmith purses up her lips, and says, “I’ll write to advise my sister to send her daughters to some good school.”  Ellen, maybe, might bear one, but ah! the thought of little Rosie in a good school!’

‘Like her brother Ulick in a good bank, eh?’

‘Why,’ he cried, ‘they always called me the steady Englishman!’