“The most picturesque spot in the island; finer than the boasted Killarney itself, and far and away beyond Windermere and the Scotch Lakes. I know it well. I have walked the mountains grouse-shooting, and fished every mile of the river; but what would you do with it when you called it yours? You dare not assert one single right of property; the people who live there, and whose fathers have lived there for centuries, have never acknowledged lord or master. You’ll stock it with sheep, and send an agent. They’ll eat your mutton, and shoot your agent. You’ll appeal to the law, and you might as well threaten a New Zealander with a bill in Chancery. Leave such speculations alone; there are no fortunes to be made here, nor even fame for having reformed us. All the privilege your purchase will confer, will be to feed us in times of famine, and be shot at when prices rise and the nights grow longer.” “Why, you are more discouraging than Grenfell!” “I don’t know about Grenfell, but I know that Ireland is not to be bettered by men like you. It is out of our own rough energies must come the cure for our own coarse maladies. Go back and build model cottages in Norfolk, give prizes to your oldest farm labourer, or the mother of the largest family. Here’s your yawl; good-by.” “Do step in and come on board with me, Luttrell, if only for an hour or two.” “No, I cannot. I’d not stand your friend’s impertinences about Ireland, besides, and I’d be led into rudenesses, which I’d not forgive myself. Lady Vyner is not with you?” “No, she’s in Wales, at Llantlannoch, where I wish you’d let me tell her you were coming to see her.” “Who knows!” “My dear Luttrell, is this a promise?” “No, not exactly.” “Will you write to me.” “I think not.” “May I write to you?” “I’d rather you wonld not. You cannot suspect, Vyner, how painful even these few minutes we have passed together will render the life I go back to; do not add to that bitterness by what wonld become a ceaseless sorrow.” “But Harry. Let Harry come to us; there is an excellent school at Wrexham.” “There’s a school on that promontory yonder, where the master, besides reading and writing, instructs in net-mending, sail-making, caulking, and fish salting. Your Wrexham fellow couldn’t compete with that. Good-by.” With a hurried shake of the hand, and as though nervously irritable at being stared at by the sailors, Luttrell moved away, and Vyner gazed after him for a moment, and stepped into the boat. “Mr. Crab says, Sir, that the weather looks dirty outside,” said the coxswain; but Vyner did not heed the remark, and sat deeply buried in his own thoughts. CHAPTER VII. A COTTAGE IN WALES.