In the spring of 18-- I was living, on a visit with a friend, in the neighbourhood of a small country town in one of the most fertile and prosperous districts of the island. The population was almost entirely free from that abject and squalid poverty which is the lot of the Irish peasantry beyond that of all other descriptions of civilized people. I remarked particularly of this neighbourhood that it had a larger proportion of respectable farmers and of that species of country gentlemen called _squireens_, than any other part of the country I had ever lived in. To this latter class belonged the heads of two branches of the same family, both of whom resided in the immediate vicinity of my friend’s house. Their names were Peter and James Kavanagh. Peter was by many years the elder of the two; his family consisted of three grown-up sons and one daughter. Peter had married in early life, and his wife died in giving birth to a fifth child, which did not long survive its mother. James had a large family of young children. Peter’s only daughter, Alice, had been brought up in her uncle’s house in order that she might receive the education and care which a girl of her tender age, without a mother, might expect from the kindness of her nearest female relative. The family of Peter Kavanagh, then, consisted of himself, his three sons, and a single in-door servant as housekeeper, who was already an old woman and of indolent habits. The household of a widower in the middle and humbler ranks of life is rarely ordered with regularity and decorum, and Peter’s was no exception to the general case. Every room had an aspect of untidiness and discomfort. Seldom were the boards of the floors or staircase washed or swept--seldom were the window panes cleansed, or the hearth-flag whitened, or the tables rubbed, or the chairs dusted. Things soiled were never cleaned--things broken were never mended--things lost were never replaced. Each of the family felt in turn the inconvenience of this state of things, but one threw the blame upon the other, and nothing was done to remedy the evil. Every one thought it strange that such a good practical farmer and shrewd man-of-the-world as Peter Kavanagh should care so little about the comforts or conveniences of every-day existence--but so it was.