“Oh, by Jove! that is different. What a stupid fellow the waiter is! Never mind; sit down. Let us have a glass of wine together. You shall have two of the horses. Old Wilkins must only make his spurs supply the place of the leaders.” There was a hearty good-nature in every accent of the old man's voice, and Forester drew his chair to the table, by no means sorry to spend some time longer in his company. There is a kind of conversation sacred to the occupations of the table,--a mixture of the culinary and the social, the gustatory with the agreeable. And the stranger led the way to this, with the art of an accomplished proficient, and while recommending the good things to Forester's attention, contrived to season their enjoyment by a tone at once pleasing and cordial. “I could have sworn you were hungry,” said he, laughing, as Forester helped himself for the second time to the grouse-pie. “I know you did not expect so appetizing a supper in such a place; but Rickards has always something in the larder for an old acquaintance, and I have been travelling this road close upon sixty years now.” “And a dreary way it is,” said Forester, “except for this most agreeable incident. I never came so many miles before with so little to interest me.” “Very true; it is a flat, monotonous-looking country, and poor besides; but nothing like what I remember it as a boy.” “You surely do not mean that the people were ever worse off than they seem now to be?” “Ay, a hundred times worse off. They may be rack-rented and over-taxed in some instances now,--not as many as you would suppose, after all,--but then, they were held in actual slavery, nearly famished, and all but naked; no roads, no markets; subject to the caprice of the landowners on every occasion in life, and the faction fights--those barbarous vestiges of a rude time--kept up and encouraged by those who should have set the better example of mutual charity and good feeling. These unhappy practices have not disappeared, but they are far less frequent than formerly; and however the confession may seem to you a sad one, to me there is a pride in saying, Ireland is improving.” “It is hard to conceive a people more miserably off than these,” said Forester, with a sigh. “So they seem to your eyes; but let me remark that there is a transition state between rude barbarism and civilization which always appears more miserable than either; habits of life which suggest wants that can rarely, if ever, be supplied. The struggle between poverty and the desire for better, is a bitter conflict, and such is the actual condition of this people. You are young enough to witness the fruits of the reformation; I am too old ever to hope to see them, but I feel assured that the day is coming.” “I like your theory well; it has Hope for its ally,” said Forester, as he gazed on the benevolent features of the old squire.