“Cheers for The O’Mahony!” some one cried out, excitedly; but he held up a warning hand. “Better not holler till you git out o’ the woods,” he said, and then went on: “Seein’ that you’ve never, any of you, be’n under fire, I’ve thought of somethin’ that’ll help you to keep a stiff upper-lip, when the time comes to need it. A good many of you are O’Mahonys born; all of you come from men who have followed The O’Mahony of their time in battle. Well, in them old days, you know, they used to carry their _cathach_ with them, to bring ’em luck, same as American boys spit on their bait when they’re fishin’. So I’ve had Malachy, here, bring along a box, specially made for the purpose, an’ it’s chuck full of the bones of a family saint of mine. We found him--me an’ Jerry--after the wind had blown part of the convent down, layin’ just where he was put when he died, with the crucifix in his hands, and a monk’s gown on. I ain’t a very good man, an’ p’r’aps you fellows have noticed that I ain’t much of a hand for church, or that sort of thing; but I says to myself, when I found this dead an’ dried body of an O’Mahony who _was_ pious an’ good an’ all that: ‘You shall come along with us, friend, an’ see our tussle through.’ He was an Irishman in the days when Irishmen run their own country in their own way, an’ I thought he’d be glad to come along with us now, an’ see whether we was fit to call ourselves Irishmen, too. An’ I reckon you’ll be glad, too, to have him with us.” Stirred by a solitary impulse, the men looked toward the box at the bow--a rudely built little chest, with strips of worn leather nailed to its sides and top--and took off their hats. “We are, O’Mahony!” they cried. “Up with your sails, then!” The O’Mahony shouted, with a sudden change to eager animation. And in a twinkling the _Hen Hawk_ had ceased dal lying, and, with stiffly bowed canvas and a buoyant, forward careen, was kicking the spray behind her into the receding picture of the Dunmanus cliffs. ***** Nearly five hours later, a little council, or, one might better say, dialogue of war, was held at the stern of the speeding vessel. The rifles had long since been taken out and put together, and the cartridges which Jerry had already made up distributed. The men were gathered forward, ready for whatever adventure their chief had in mind. “I’m goin’ to lay to in a minute or two,” confided The O’Mahony to Jerry, in an undertone. Jerry looked inquiringly up and down the deserted stretch of brown headlands before them. Not a sign of habitation was in view. “Is it _this_ we’ve come to besayge and capture?” he asked, with incredulity.