148 WILD SPORTS OF THE WEST. 



gun across his arm, and a case of pistols projecting from 

 his coat pockets, he took the wine his patron gave him ! 

 but, " chacun d son gout" my kinsman would not 

 lose him for a thousand, while his very look gives me the 

 horrors ! Even the piper appears to have caught the 

 general infection : he has been lilting a full hour not 

 a jig or strathspey, but love-lorn ditties, and the most 

 lamentable compositions that ever issued from the 

 bag or chanter. 



Would I were in England again ! for what is matri- 

 mony to manslaughter ? I have been for a moment out 

 to breathe the cool sea-breeze, and passing the window 

 peeped into that refugium peccatorum, the kitchen. The 

 keeper is flinting a blunderbuss ! There is security in 

 Terracina contrasted with this cabin, and the Abruzzi 

 is a land of Goshen compared with the mountains of 

 Ballycroy ! I wish I were in bed ; and why there 

 to dream of everything felonious ! I may as well submit 

 with Turkish endurance it is the will of Allah. The 

 Colonel replenishes the fire, apportioning turf and bog 

 deal in such scientific proportion, that it is evident that 

 he is making himself up for a wet evening ; and the cork 

 our host is now extracting will be merely avant-courier 

 to three flasks which I see lurking in the cooper. Oh, 

 that a deputation from the Temperance Society would 

 drop in ! But why complain ? 'tis useless. The 

 Colonel has discharged a bumper to the speedy demo- 

 lition of Mr. Burke ! Nor has he forgotten to replenish 

 again. The man is honest a person that one might 

 safely drink with in the dark. He clears his throat, 

 and that cough preliminary is the prologue of a story. 

 I must, in common courtesy, be attentive. This long 

 and steady pinch is alarming, and we are on the brink 

 pf some desperate detail ! 



