“‘You’re murderin’ your own child, Mrs. Considine,’ I said: ‘you are killing her as surely as if you put a pistol to her head, or poison to her lips.’ “The wicked old man called to Mary from the bottom of the stairs to go down, and added a curse on her delay: the bridesmaids—one in particular, who was as hard as the rest at first, had kept on saying—God forgive her—that love one side was like a fire, and would soon catch the other—now looked terrified, and pity-struck. “Again the call and the curse were repeated: Mary started, as if from a dream: she drank off a glass of water from her mother’s hand, who kept repeating—‘That’s a jewel, there’s a darlin’, _corra machree_ was she,’ and such like nonsense; to which the poor girl made no reply, but pressed her hands on her temples, and whispered to me—‘Pray to God for me!’ She walked straight into the room: the bridegroom met her with ‘Sweet Love,’ and a flourish of his pocket-handkerchief, a smile on his lips—but such oak-sticks between his eyes. She put him on one side with her little hand, and advancing to the priest, knelt down reverently before him: there was a hush in the room, nothing heard but the clink of the gold in the leather bag the old man was shaking out of pride. “O, it would have melted a heart of stone to look at that young creature! Tears overflowing her face, so that she could not speak, and her hands wrung together. “The bridegroom whispered something to her mother about her being nervous, but it would soon go off: I could have killed him! He then handed round the ring for us to look at; aye, while SHE was weeping and trembling at the priest’s feet. When he held it to me, I struck it down. Aunt, I could not help it! What a look he gave! It rolled along the floor; but his attention was drawn to Mary’s words. “‘Father,’ she sobbed, to the priest, ‘save me—save me from my own people; save me, a young, helpless girl; save me from marrying him I hate. Oh, do not let them put the sin of a false oath upon my young head—I cannot love him. Father, you know I owned to you in holy confession, but ten days past, that I loved another—that I love him still. I will never, never speak to him, or write to him, or ask to set eyes on him again; I will quit the world, and go into a holy house if you think me fit for it—but oh, save me, save me from perjuring my soul—save me,’ she repeated wildly, ‘or I shall go mad!’ To see the holy priest raise her up; to see him place her in his own chair; to see him put his hands upon her head, and hear his words of comfort! ‘Trust in me, my dear child; I will never join a willing to an unwilling hand; be calm, my child; and you,’ he said, turning to the bridegroom, ‘and you, have _you_ the feelings of a man, to stand by and see this, and wish to keep her to her promise?’