“And three times the number die,” said a voice near, “when a bad season comes.” “And what if they do?” cried Dan: “’tis a blessed land for all that, with a golden sun to live under, and a green turf to lie under.” “It’s a vile country,” cried Murdoch, emboldened by hope of support from the bystanders. “Your children are as hungry as cannibals, and as naked as savages. When the sun shines, you thank the powers and lie still in your laziness——” “There’s reason for that,” interrupted Dan. “There are so many to do the work, we can’t settle who is to begin; and so we’re content to take no trouble; and this is the most your Rob and Meg have learned of me.” “And then when there comes a blank harvest, you fight over one another’s graves.” “Sure the powers forgive the sin,” cried Dan. “Craving stomachs drive to blows, and then the priest is merciful.” “More merciful than you are to one another when the fever comes, cruel savages as you are! If your own mother took the fever, you would turn her into a shed by the road side, and let her tend herself. You would go quietly smoking your pipe past the very place where your own father lay dying, and never speak a word or move a finger for him.” “’Tis false as to not speaking a word. We pray for them in the fever day and night; and many’s the mass I have vowed against I grow richer. The fever is a judgment of Heaven, and where is the good of catching it if we can help it? They that sent it will take care of them that have it, and what is our care to theirs?” “Shame! shame!” was the cry from all sides; and some who were on their way home with a pan full of meal or a basket full of pease, stopped to listen why. “Shame! shame!” cried Dan, mimicking the shouters. “You just don’t know what you’re talking about; for them that have the fever don’t cry shame.” “Not in their hearts?” “Never a bit;—and don’t I know that had an uncle in the fever twice, and moved him for fear we should fall down in it too? Didn’t he come crawling out the first time when we were bringing a coffin and supposing him dead, and did not he help the wail for himself before we saw him among us? and would he have wailed in a joke, if he had cried ‘Shame!’ in his heart? and who such a judge as himself?” “What happened the next time, Dan?” “The next time ’twas his ghost in earnest that went to the burial; and a pretty burial it was. O, there’s no place like old Ireland for care of the dead! We beat you there entirely, you unnatural ruffians, that never give so much as a howl to your nearest flesh and blood!”