The engineer was driven up to where they were standing, and he jumped off the car among the men who were to work under him with rather a pretentious air. He had not observed, or probably had not known, Herbert Fitzgerald. He was a very young fellow, still under one-and-twenty, beardless, light-haired, blue-eyed, and fresh from England. "And what hill is this?" said he to the driver.
"Ballydahan, shure, yer honer. That last war Connick-a-coppul, and that other, the big un intirely, where the crass road takes away to Buttevant, that was Glounthauneroughtymore. Faix and that's been the murthering hill for cattle since first I knew it. Bedad yer honer 'll make it smooth as a bowling-green."
"Ballydahan," said the young man, taking a paper out of his pocket and looking up the names in his list, "I've got it. There should be thirty-seven of them here."
"Shure an' here we are these siven hours," said our friend of the hoe, "and mighty cowld we are."
"Thady Molloy and Shawn Brady," called out the engineer, managing thoroughly to Anglicise the pronunciation of the names, though they were not Celtically composite to any great degree.
"Yez, we's here," said Thady, coming forward. And then Herbert came up and introduced himself, and the young engineer took off his hat. "I came away from Mallow before eight," said he apologetically; "but I have four of these places to look after, and when one gets to one of them it is impossible to get away again. There was one place where I was kept two hours before I could get one of the men to understand what they were to do. What is it you call that big hill?"
"Glounthauneroughtymore, yer honer," said the driver, to whom the name was as easy and familiar as his own.
"And you are going to set these men to work now?" said Herbert.
"Well, I don't suppose they'll do much to-day, Mr. Fitzgerald. But I must try and explain to the head men how they are to begin. They have none of them any tools, you see." And then he called out again. "Thady Molloy and Shawn Brady."
"We's here," said Thady again; "we did not exactly know whether yer honer'd be afther beginning at the top or the botthom. That's all that war staying us."