234 THE GARDEN. 



those light and airy cljambers, I had, many a 

 night, Slink into pleasant repose ; awakened by the 

 morning beam, to rove through a wilderness of the 

 choicest sweets, and then to kneel amid the house- 

 hold band, uniting my devotions at that family altar. 

 There was no fiction in it : nothing for imagination 

 to fill up ; all was reality, deep-felt, agonizing 

 truth : and though, I bless my God, I do love 

 Ireland, and mourn tor her, and have tried to serve 

 her, even from that very time, yet I never so loved, 

 I never so grieved, I never so burned to spend and 

 be spent for her, as when that appalling description 

 was given, of scenes where my bosom's warmest 

 affections had been drawn out, and where the vic- 

 tims of popish persecution were my friends, my 

 endeared, my hospitable Christian friends ; and 

 the wretched instruments of destruction were the 

 smiling peasants, whose cabins I had visited, 

 whose children I had fondled, and from whose 

 scanty meal of potatoes I had often accepted the 

 choicest morsel, rather than hurt their generous 

 feelings, by declining that which they could ill af- 

 ford to give. My poor, warm-hearted, impetuous, 

 deluded Irish ! What can I do for them ? What, 

 but pray and plead for their immortal souls, drag- 

 ged into perdition by means of chains, that you, 

 reader, might well assist to break. 



The dear young pastor who related this touch- 

 ing story, gave a singular instance of the efficacy 



