country. One evening as M’Adam and his train returned from a long and unsuccessful chase of Edmund Barry’s fox, their route lay by the ruins of the ancient church of Kildinan; near this sacred spot a whitethorn tree had stood, and its beauty and bloom were the theme of every tongue. The simple devotee who poured his orisons to God beneath its holy shade believed that the hands of guardian spirits pruned its luxuriance and developed its form of beauty--that dews from heaven were sprinkled by angel hands to produce its rich and beautiful blossoms, which, like those of the thorn of Glastonbury, loaded the black winds of December with many a token of holy fragrance, in welcome of the heavenly advent of HIM who left his Father’s throne to restore to the sons of Adam the lost inheritance of heaven. M’Adam was charmed with the beauty of the tree, and little regarding the sanctity or the superstitious awe attached to its character, was resolved to transfer it to Lisnegar, that his lawn might possess that rare species of thorn which blooms in beauty when all its sisters of the field are bare and barren. Next day, when M’Adam signified his intention of removing the whitethorn of Kildinan, his people stood aghast at his impiety, and one and all declared they would suffer a thousand deaths rather than perpetrate so audacious a sacrilege. Now, M’Adam was a man of high blood and haughty bearing, and accustomed at all times to the most rigid enforcement of his commands. When he found his men unhesitatingly refuse to obey him, his anger sent the glow of resentment to flush his cheek; he spurned the earth in a paroxysm of rage, exclaiming, ‘Varlets! of all that have eaten the bread of M’Adam, and reposed under the shadow of his protection, are there none free from the trammels of superstitious folly, to execute his commands?’ ‘Here are seven of your own name and race,’ cried David Barry, ‘men sworn to stand and fall together, who obey no commands but yours, and acknowledge no law but your will. The whitethorn of Kildinan shall leave its sacred tenement, if strong hands and brave hearts can effect its removal. If it be profanation to disturb the tree which generations have reverenced, the curse for sacrilege rests not with us: and did M’Adam command us to tear the blessed gold from the shrine of a saint, we would not hesitate to obey--we were but executing the will of our legal chief.’ Such was the flattering unction which the retainers of M’Adam applied to their souls, as they proceeded to desecrate the spot hallowed by the reverence of ages, and around whose holy thorn superstition had drawn a mystic circle, within whose limit human foot may not intrude. Men have not yet forgotten this lesson of the feudal school; the sack of cities, the shrieks of women, the slaughter of thousands, are yet perpetrated without ruth or remorse in obedience to superior command, and the sublime _Te Deum_ swells to consecrate the savage atrocity.