steeped in whiskey on her nose, looked at them for a moment through her large green spectacles, and addressed them both in a tone of great familiarity, observing,

"Well, who knows but we may meet in heaven yet; little chance as there seems for some of us now, why! for we've met often enough in this world any how, and may again when least expected. And its little yez thought when ye refused me a third in your chay to Tipperary, that I'd be shewing you Court Fitzadelm; and is as much mistress here as the lady, if she was in it, and will be till it fall into better hands, plaze God. Why then, yez had great luck, gentlemen, not to go in the chay from Dublin; for its in it, shure,. I got one of my rheumatrix fits, all down the face and head of me. And it was the Lord's will, I should be overturned last night, coming here, and broke my nose, why! Well, what matter? Shure I'll

be worse afore I'm better; for whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth. Is Is my strength the strength of stone, or is my flesh of brass? No, troth! And so this young man here tells me yez want to see the consarn. Why then, its a sad place now; a watch-tower in a wilderness. And little ever I thought to see the likes of yez in it again, though many of your sort frequented it formerly.".

"Of our sort? Why what do you take us for?" asked the Commodore in some surprise, tinctured with seeming uneasiness.

"For two rakes of quality, dear, going about the innocent country, seeking whom yez may devour, like the old one, why!"

The gentlemen both smiled; and even De Vere seemed not displeased at the definition given of his appearance by the formidable Mrs. Magillicuddy, alias "Protestant Moll." Still, however, he hung back, and looked upon her with disgust and apprehension.

"I understand," said the Commodore, "that this old mansion, with a few acres of the ancient demesne, is to be sold, and I wish to examine the premises, before I apply for the terms to Mr. Crawley, to whose seat I am now proceeding." "As to the house," said Mrs. Magillicuddy, " it is an house of clay now;" and she waddled before them towards the theatre, the door of which she threw open. "An house of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, and which is crushed before the moth. There!-there's the devil's tabernacle."

Curiosity now got the better of prejudice; and Mr. De Vere approached to examine this monument of former dissipation and refinement, in scenes so inappropriate to its site. Most of the decorations, and nearly all the seats and scenery, had been removed. But fragments of scarlet cloth remained upon a bench, which had not been taken away. A cut wood scene still occupied the stage; and some orna

mental painting and gilding were visible on the ceiling and cornice.

"This was a box fitted up for the Lord Lieutenant," said Mrs. Magillicuddy, seating herself on the solitary bench; " and when the bishop's lady came here to see me, after my wonderful conversion (and it was Miss Crawley that delivered me from the workings of iniquity,) and found the Rev. Mr. Scare'um sitting with me in this very place, (for he came to visit this benighted district, and to take under his protection the perishing sinners of the hill country) says the bishop's lady to me, (for my conversion made a great noise, far and near.) No, says Mr. Scare'um to Miss Crawley, it is curious to see, says he, by what great strides Molly Magillicuddy has made her way out of Babylon. Upon which, the bishop's lady remarked-."

"I cannot stand this," cried De Vere to the Commodore in Spanish. "I will walk down to the river, while you ex

amine the house, if you really think there is any thing worth seeing."

Mrs. Magillicuddy now rose with surprising alertness, and observed: "May be yez would like to see the ould family pictures which will go with the house, being worth nothing now, barring the frames, the best being gone."

The family pictures seemed to counteract the effect of even Mrs. Magillicuddy's egotistical jargon, who seemed to trade upon the history of her conversion, and to suppose, with pious vanity, that it interested her auditors as much as herself. The gentlemen followed her up the hall, while she continued her recital with" So, as I was saying, the bishop's lady, thinking me a miracle of grace (though, lord help me, I was then but a babe in knowledge, never having listened hardly to Mr. Scare'um, nor lived with the sarious), she says to me,