Matters, however, looked more serious on the farm on the other side of the pond, which had always harboured the most turbulent set of people on the whole estate. That hoary old sinner, Peter, of whom you shall hear more anon, had been allowed, through the stupidity, carelessness, or good-nature of some of the former stewards, to take such liberties there, that at last he had the consummate impudence to assert that he, and not Squire Bull, was the Lord Paramount. He even appointed deputies, who claimed a sort of jurisdiction; and if he did not venture actually to uplift the rents, he hinted broadly enough that nobody was bound in conscience to pay them to the Squire, or to render stipend to Patrick, who acted as the Squire's chaplain in those parts. Dan, the old Rabiator, as he was called, had been long his chief agent in the farm; but Dan was now dead, and the man who assumed his place was little better than a nincompoop. Nobody, in fact, could have done Peter's business half so well as Dan. He always kept--at least almost always--on the windy side of the law; talked wildly enough, in all conscience, but abstained from overt acts; and knew precisely how to avail himself of the necessities of the steward for the time being, who was often forced to apply to him for a helping hand in cases of strong emergency. In this way Dan was able to provide handsomely for his family, most of whom were located in different situations of indifferent trust in the service of Squire Bull; and he managed, moreover, to secure a snug little income for himself, by levying a kind of black-mail, called Daniel's pence, at all the fairs and gatherings on the farm. But when Dan died, he left no Elisha behind him. One Byrne tried to put on his mantle--a sorry one it was by this time--and he insisted that all the disciples of Peter, and all others on the farm who bore no goodwill to the Squire, were bound to follow him, on the ground that, before the Christian era, an ancestor of his was supposed to have possessed a corner of the farm rent-free. He had a seat in the under servants' hall, but he refused to attend at commons, alleging that he did not get as much as he was entitled to; and, after several acts of foolery, he fairly crossed over to the farm, and called upon Donnybrook and Shilelah, and the other merry lads who used to roar in the wake of Dan, to follow him, and knock the constables of the Squire on the head. A bigger fool than Byrne you never met with on a summer's day. His game evidently was to have played Peter's cards, to keep temporising whenever he could, and to have done all in his power to advance the interests of that stealthy Jesuit. Peter would have backed him to any extent, so long as he stood up solely for the interests and the rights of Peter; but the moment he deserted that principle, and advanced his own preposterous claims, he found the back of Peter's hand turned to him with a vengeance. A sad sight it