father's faith was tried. A few months remained to him before he was to be taken to his Scottish prison. If my lady should allow him to go there, without making an effort to prevent it--why then she, Madam Gillin, would open her mouth and speak. Her lips had been closed over-long. Had she not sworn an oath beside that deathbed? It would become her bounden duty to interfere, if the countess lacked courage so to do. It was touching that in moments of severest trial my lady should always have been engrossed by the interests of her black sheep. She always thought of Shane rather than of herself; and he gave her little satisfaction in return for this great love. Never very white, he was daily growing darker. One evil thought engenders another; one evil deed makes a second necessary: we were all taught that in earliest infancy, and Shane's condition was in accordance with the rule. His prowess in the past as King of Cherokees had brought him little blame in public estimation, for the Glandores had been fire-eaters time out of mind, and the Irish love a spark with mettle in him. But his conduct since he departed for Glas-aitch-é was on many sides disapproved as shady. The Viceroy openly showed his mean opinion of him. His tenants had protested by injuring his cattle and destroying his crops. He was proud, was Shane, as well as naturally reckless, and was fond of notoriety. He resented the Viceroy's treatment, and was furious with the tenants; and became more wrathful still with Terence, to whose ill-advised conduct he imputed his own growing unpopularity. What was the use of having mixed himself up in the odium of Tone's capture if his brother was to cut the ground from under his feet? It was but too probable that he might whistle both for an English peerage and comforting bits in the way of sinecures; and all because of Terence. Was it not enough to provoke a saint--much more an Irish earl, who considered himself a pauper? Lord Cornwallis was unkind and rude. My Lord Glandore complained of his uncivil treatment to Lord Clare. The chancellor, with an eye to business, soothed his _amour-propre_, and roundly told the Viceroy in private that he must constrain himself to be civil to the peers. Then he broke ground to Shane with reference to the union, explaining that he might put himself quite right if he would work with the executive in this matter. He must promise his vote in the House of Lords and all his influence in the Commons, and then his gracious Majesty would doubtless give substantial proofs of his approval. Shane promised that he would follow this worldly-wise advice. As my Lord Clare so cogently observed, the union was arranged--was to all intents and purposes a _fait accompli_. Lord Glandore's influence could not prevent the end, even if that peer should elect to be disinterested. What a lack of common prudence would he show then, if for a crotchet he should bar himself out of Tom Tiddler's ground! His brother's ruin showed the