Big Jack Dax,--he that's my lady's steward at The Beg,--had a nephew, one Misther Millet, a small bit of a man, mighty puny and spruce, with a white face, and pimples on his chin, but no beard; you'd think a breath would blow him away; and about the time I'm spaking of, he came over from Liverpool,--where he was something of a clerk,--on a visit here to his uncle, for a couple of months,--to get his health, as you'd think if you looked at him;--but, as _he_ said, to enjoy “the rude romantic beauties of the coast:”--them were his words. He wrote verses, and picked up bits of shells and sea-weed, and amused himself in ways sensible people wouldn't dream of. Some of us thought he was so-so in his senses; but his uncle said it was no such thing,--he was only a genius. Above all things in this world, what should small Misther Millet do, but attack little Norah, after meeting her two or three times, while he was poking about with a long stick, for shells, on the beach where she got her dillosk! He had heard of her misfortune, but didn't know of her deportment to them that attempted to bill and coo with her: so, one day, he struck up to her, quite confident of himself, and began to be familiar. But he got such a rebuff from the little Dillosk-woman, that he gave up shell-gathering, and took to digging for things in the hills, which, he said, was carried away there at the time of the great deluge; and just that day se'nnight after his talking to Norah, Misther Millet didn't come home to dinner,--no, nor supper; and all night they saw no sight of him,--though they sat up in hopes of his coming; wid, at last, big Jack Dax gave up his nephew as lost,--no one knew where. It happened rather unluckily for Misther Millet to mislay himself just then, for there was great goings-on at The Beg:--you'll hear, by-and-by, what they were about. It was Norah herself that poor Tommy Maloe offered to marry; and from that, and his doing her a good turn, and saying a kind word for her when he could, some of us thought it was he seduced her. But though he was a fine fellow, and well to do, she wouldn't listen to him. With that, we changed opinions again, and couldn't determine among ourselves, or in our own minds even, how to settle the question. And what bothered us more than all was, that though Norah said downright “nay” to his offers, it's often she begged him to take Bat Boroo's advice, and not go for a souldier: however, he wouldn't heed her. And when news came of his being killed abroad, Norah wint and wept with his poor father, and did all she could to comfort the childless ould crature in his sorrow.