“But about poor Mary. She was overjoyed that her father and mother took so to me, and, indeed, so was I, for the music of home is in Mary’s sweet voice; and it is the next best thing to being in my own land, to hear her sing ‘The Exile of Erin;’ and then, while the tears are wet on my cheek, she tunes up ‘Shielan-a-guira,’ with a heart and a half; her eyes are so beaming with light, that you wonder where the dark place is in them, and yet it’s all the time a light in darkness. I can’t discourse you now her features one by one, but altogether: the poor Irish never pass her in the street without a blessing, or the English without a stare—still I saw that Mary was far from happy. I have not much time to watch or inquire, but I could not sleep for thinking of her—Mrs. Considine’s mouth was full of the titles of the great quality she’d see in the Park, and she traveled about with a book she called a peerage, in her pocket, while poor Mary would show me the bits of flowers she’d pick out of the grass, or bring my mistress a bunch of violets from Covent Garden Market. As to her father, he hardly ever stirs out, except to watch that his son, who has a situation at Blackwall, does not spend his pence on an omnibus—he makes a fair god of his money; how the priest gets over it I don’t know, for he’s the greatest miser I ever heard of—a fair neager[22]—not like his countrymen. “Well, aunt; at last poor little Mary let me into the very heart of her trouble. She was in love—in love with maybe you think some delicate dandy chap of an Englishman; for Mary is very little—a fairy of a thing, (God bless us!) that might pass for a real ‘fairy’ in her own country—as thin as a willow-wand, as straight as a bullrush, but small, you understand. I wanted her to tell me who it was, and she used to hide her face and cry, and then look up, blushing like a rose among the dew-drops. At last, she said she’d _show_ him to me next evening; she was going to confession, and he would do the same, and meet her at the door. So away they went. There were three or four young men at the door, one with a sky-blue tie and a fine waistcoat. I was so sure _that was him_, that I never looked at any one else; but she passed on, tossing her head disdainfully at the blue tie. “‘He’s not here,’ she whispered; and the little creature trembled on my arm. She soon made a clean breast, and I waited, as I had leave to do; the sky-blue tie waited also, but Mary was too quick for him, she darted round the corner, while he was admiring his own shadow, thrown by the full moon on the wall, and I after her.