Each parent took his turn in providing the company with an official feast. The old lord monopolised the fireworks. My stepfather instituted races. A wealthy barrister, our neighbour, inveigled a circus for our delectation; and seven delightful old maids, who lived in a kind of castle of their own, outdid all the fathers royally by a regatta of our own. All the boatmen of Dalkey were hired, and each boat ran up a sail. Mighty powers! what a day that was. Were ever youngsters so gratified, so excited, so conscious of being a little community apart, with the sea and the land for its entertainment? And there was an amiable old judge, who offered us the freedom of his big orchard, where the apples grew in quantities, and we climbed the trees like squirrels, and devoured fruit without fear or restraint. Chapter XXIV. MY ELDEST SISTER. My eldest sister was only fourteen, but she was already, had ever been, a sage and a saint. At the age of eight she had put her hand into a blazing fire in order to die the death of a Christian martyr. She shrieked dismally for several hours afterwards. Another time, staying with relatives in the country, she knelt in the gloaming in a big barn, praying with fervently closed eyes, in the hopes of being devoured by lions. She heard the distant growlings of an angry mastiff, and thought her prayer was granted, and that this was the ravening lion about to make a meal of her. She fell down in a fit of convulsions, and had to be nursed by several doctors. When she came back to consciousness, with her hair shorn and wan little hands upon the coverlet, she recognised our tender mother seated beside her bed, and contentedly shortening her last new frock for my second sister. She offered up the mortification for her sins, and instantly said a prayer to her patron saint, Agnes. At dinner she never ate pudding or pie, not even damson-pie, for which I in those gluttonous days would have sold, not only my own soul, but hers as well; but after dinner she invariably carried her share of these luxurious edibles to the nearest poor person. She visited the poor continually, always provided with tea and sugar and such things; and Pauline, who accompanied her on these missions of mercy, assured me that she often saw the pet cases of misery dash under the bed excellent dishes of bacon and eggs and bottles of Guinness' stout, while the traditional invalid would jump into bed, gather the clothes about her, and begin to whine, "Sure, your little ladyship, 'tis our lonesome selves as hasn't had bit or sup since last we saw your purty face." My eldest sister was a bewitching beauty. She had large dusky blue eyes in constant communion with the heavenly spheres. She had ruddy golden hair that shown adown her back like pounded guineas, and her complexion was a thing to gape at. Indeed we had all inherited from our mother wonderful golden locks and dazzling complexions.