"Your honers are welcome, Miss; your honers are welcome, Captain Ussher," said Denis, forgetting that, for the present, he was only a guest himself; and then Brady, and then Shamuth na Pibu'a, the blind piper from County Mayo, "who had made the music out of his own head, all about O'Connell"--and then Biddy, and Mrs. Mehan, and all the boys and girls one after another, got up, and ducked their heads down in token of kindly welcome to the "young misthress and her lover;" and though most of those present, at other times, would have said that it was a pity their own Miss Feemy should be marrying "a born inimey of the counthry, like a Revenue officer, and a black Prothestant too," it wasn't now, when she had come to honour the wedding of one of themselves, that they would be remembering anything against her or her lover. "Well, Mary, so the time's nearly come," said Feemy, as she sat down on the bench by the fire, that Mary, regardless of all bridal propriety, wiped down for her with the tail of her white dress; saying, as she did so, "What harum? sure won't the dust make it worse, when the dancing comes on, and--" "Whisper, Mary." "What is it, Miss? "Whisper, then." "Ah, now! you'll be at me like the rest of 'em;" and she put her big face down over Feemy's. "Are the sheets done, Mary?" "Ah now! Miss, you're worse than 'em all!" and Mary put her big hand with the big cotton glove, with the fingers widely extended, before her face to hide the virgin blush. "What's that, Feemy?" said Father John; "what's that I heard?" "Go asy, now, Father John, do;" and Mary gave the priest a playful push, which nearly put him into the fire; "for God's sake, Miss, don't be telling him, now; you won't, darlint?" "What was it, Feemy? all's fair now, you know." "Only just something Mary was to get ready for her husband, then, Father John--nothing particular. You'll never be married yourself, you know, so you needn't ask." "Oh! part of the fortune, was it? Trust Denis, he'll look to that; is it the pigs, eh, Denis?" "No, Father John, it jist a'nt the pigs," said Mary. "Come, what is it?--out with it Denis." "Sorrow a one of me knows what you're talking about," said Denis. "It a'nt the calf at last, Denis, is it?" "Bad luck to it for a calf!" exclaimed McGovery; and then, sidling up to the priest, "you wouldn't be setting all the boys laughing at me, Father John, and thim sthrangers, too." "Well, well, Denis, but why didn't you tell me the whole?"