Every one must necessarily be acquainted with the ceremony of _barring out_. This took place at Easter and Christmas. The master was brought or sent out on some fool's errand, the door shut and barricaded, and the pedagogue excluded, until a certain term of vacation was extorted. With this, however, the master never complied until all his efforts at forcing an entrance were found to be ineffectual; because if he succeeded in getting in, they not only had no claim to a long vacation, but were liable to be corrected. The schoolmaster had also generally the clerkship of the parish; an office, however, which in the country parts of Ireland is without any kind of salary, beyond what results from the patronage of the priest; a matter of serious moment to a teacher, who, should he incur his Reverence's displeasure, would be immediately driven out of the parish. The master, therefore, was always tyrannical and insolent to the people, in proportion as he stood high in the estimation of the priest. He was also a regular attendant at all wakes and funerals, and usually sat among a crowd of the village sages engaged in exhibiting his own learning, and in recounting the number of his religious and literary disputations. One day, soon after the visit of the gentlemen above mentioned, two strange men came into Mat's establishment--rather, as Mat thought, in an unceremonious manner. “Is your name Matthew Kavanagh?” said one of them. “That is indeed the name that's upon me,” said Mat, with rather an infirm voice, whilst his face got as pale as ashes. “Well,” said the fellow, “we'll just trouble you to walk with us a bit.” “How far, with submission, are yez goin' to bring me?” said Mat. “Do you know Johnny Short's hotel?” * * The county jail.--Johnny Short was for many years the Governor of Monaghan jail. It was to him the _Mittimus_ of “Fool Art,” mentioned in Phelim O'Toole's Courtship, was directed. If the reader will suspend his curiosity, that is, provided he feels any, until he comes to the sketch just mentioned, he will get a more ample account of Johnny Short. “My curse upon you, Findramore,” exclaimed Mat, in a paroxysm of anguish, “every day you rise! but your breath's unlucky to a schoolmaster; and it's no lie what was often said, that no schoolmaster ever thruv in you, but something ill came over him.” “Don't curse the town, man alive,” said the constable, “but curse your own ignorance and folly; any way, I wouldn't stand in your coat for the wealth of the three kingdoms. You'll undoubtedly swing, unless you turn king's evidence. It's about Moore's business, Mr. Kavanagh.” “Damn the bit of that I'd do, even if I knew anything about it; but, God be praised for it, I can set them all at defiance--that I'm sure of. Gentlemen, innocence is a jewel.”