The Real Gtarlotte. 43 



of ownership, and then she condescended to dole out to 

 Mr. Lambert such payment " on account " as she deemed 

 advisable, confronting his remonstrances with her indisput- 

 able poverty, and baffling his threats with the recital of a 

 promise that she should never be disturbed in her father's 

 farm^ made to her, she alleged, by Sir Benjamin Dysart, 

 when she entered upon her inheritance. 



There had been a time when a barefooted serving-girl 

 had suffered under Miss Duffy's rule ; but for the last few 

 years the times had been bad, the price of grazing had 

 fallen, and the mistress's temper and the diet having fallen 

 in a corresponding ratio, the bondwoman had returned to 

 her own people and her father's house, and no successor 

 had been found to take her place. That is to say, no re- 

 cognised successor. But, as fate would have it, on the 

 very day that " Moireen Rhu " had wrapped her shawl 

 about her head, and stumped, with cursings, out of the 

 house of bondage, the vague stirrings that regulate the 

 perambulations of beggars had caused Billy Grainy to 

 resolve upon Gurthnamuckla as the place where he would, 

 after the manner of his kind, ask for a walletful of pota- 

 toes and a night's shelter. A week afterwards he was still 

 there, drawing water, bringing in turf, feeding the cow, and 

 receiving, in return for these offices, his board and lodging 

 and the daily dressing of a sore shin which had often 

 coerced the most uncharitable to hasty and nauseated alms- 

 giving. The arrangement glided into permanency, and 

 Billy fell into a life of lazy routine that was preserved from 

 stagnation by a daily expedition to Lismoyle to sell milk for 

 Miss Duffy, and to do a little begging on his own account. 



Gurthnamuckla had still about it some air of the older 

 days when Julia Duffy's grandfather was all but a gentleman, 

 and her drunken father and dairymaid mother were in their 

 cradles. The tall sycamores that bordered the cart track 

 were witnesses to the time when it had been an avenue, and 

 the lawn-like field was yellow in spring with the daffodils of 

 a former civilisation. The tops of the trees were thick with 

 nests, and the grave cawing of rooks made a background of 

 mellow, serious respectability that had its effect even upon 

 Francie. She said something to this intent as she and 

 Lambert jogged along the grass by the track. 



