This was too much for Lady Janet's endurance, and, amid the loud laughter of some, and the more difficultly suppressed mirth of others, the ladies arose.
“Yer na going, leddies! I hope that naething I said, Leddy Kilgoff, Leddy Janet, ech. We mun e'en console ourselves wi' the claret.” This was said sotto, as the door closed and the party reseated themselves at the table.
“My Jo Janet does like to bide a wee,” muttered he, half aloud.
“Jo!” cried the Dean, “is derived from the Italian; it's a term of endearment in both languages. It's a corruption of Gioia mia.”
“What may that mean?”
“My joy! my life!”
“Eh, that's it, is it? Ah, sir, these derivatives gat mony a twist and turn in the way from one land to the tither!” And with this profound bit of moralizing, he sipped his glass in revery.
The conversation now became more general, fewer personalities arose; and as the Dean, after a few efforts to correct statements respecting the “pedigrees of race-horses,” “the odds at hazard,” “the soundings upon the coral reefs,” “the best harpoons for the sulphur-bottomed whales,” only made new failures, he sulked and sat silent, permitting talk to take its course uninterrupted. The hussar baronet paid marked attention to Cashel, and invited him to the mess for the day following. Lord Charles overheard the invitation, and said, “I'll join the party;” while Mr. Meek, leaning over the table, in a low whisper begged Cashel to preserve the whole bull adventure a secret, as the press was really a most malevolent thing in Ireland!
During the while the Chief Justice slept profoundly, only waking as the bottle came before him, and then dropping off again. The Attorney-General, an overworked man of business, spoke little and guardedly, so that the conversation, principally left to the younger members of the party, ranged over the accustomed topics of hunting, shooting, and deer-stalking, varied by allusion, on Cashel's part, to sports of far higher, because more dangerous, excitement.
In the pleasant flurry of being attentively listened to,—a new sensation for Roland,—he arose and ascended to the drawing-room, where already a numerous party of refteshers had arrived. Here again Cashel discovered that he was a person of notoriety, and as, notwithstanding all Mr. Downie Meek's precaution, the “lasso” story had got abroad, the most wonderful versions of the incident were repeated on every side.