“Again,” called out the soldier; “and no muttering.”
“Bloody end to the Pope,” cried Father Luke in bitter desperation.
“Bloody end to the Pope,” echoed the Abbé.
“Pass bloody end to the Pope, and good night,” said the sentry, resuming his rounds, while a loud and uproarious peal of laughter behind, told the unlucky priests they were overheard by others, and that the story would be over the whole town in the morning.
Whether it was that the penance for their heresy took long in accomplishing, or that they never could summon courage sufficient to face their persecutor, certain it is, the North Cork saw them no more, nor were they ever observed to pass the precincts of the college, while that regiment occupied Maynooth.
Major Jones himself, and his confederates, could not have more heartily relished this story, than did the party to whom the doctor heartily related it. Much, if not all the amusement it afforded, however, resulted from his inimitable mode of telling, and the power of mimicry, with which he conveyed the dialogue with the sentry: and this, alas, must be lost to my readers, at least to that portion of them not fortunate enough to possess Doctor Finucane’s acquaintance.
“Fin! Fin! your long story has nearly famished me,” said the padre, as the laugh subsided; “and there you sit now with the jug at your elbow this half-hour; I never thought you would forget our old friend Martin Hanegan’s aunt.”
“Here’s to her health,” said Fin; “and your reverence will get us the chant.”
“Agreed,” said Father Malachi, finishing a bumper, and after giving a few preparatory hems, he sang the following “singularly wild and beautiful poem,” as some one calls Christabel:—
“Here’s a health to Martin Hanegan’s aunt,
And I’ll tell ye the reason why!
She eats bekase she is hungry,
And drinks bekase she is dry.
“And if ever a man,
Stopped the course of a can,
Martin Hanegan’s aunt would cry—
‘Arrah, fill up your glass,
And let the jug pass;
How d’ye know but what your neighbour’s dhry?’”