“Oh—ay—the note; I 'm sure I forget what I wrote; what was it about? Yes, to be sure, I remember now. I want you to make yourself known, up there. It is downright folly, if not worse, to be keeping up these feuds and differences in Ireland any longer; such a course might suit the small politicians of Oughterard, but you and I know better, and Martin himself knows better.”
“But I never took any part in the conflict you speak of; I lived out of it,—away from it.”
“And are therefore, exactly suited to repair a breach to which you never contributed. I assure you, my boy, the gentry—and I know them well—will meet you more than half-way. There is not a prouder fellow living than Martin there; he has throughout his whole life held his head higher than any man in our county, and yet he is quite ready to make advances towards you. Of course, what I say is strictly between ourselves; but my opinion is, that, if you like it, you may be as intimate up there as ever you were at old Hayes's, at the Priory.”
“Then, what would you have me do?” asked Nelligan.
“Just pay a visit there this morning; say that you are curious to see that great picture,—and it is a wonderful thing, if only for the size of it; or that you 'd like to have a look at Arran Island out of the big telescope at the top of the house; anything will serve as a reason, and then,—why, leave the rest to chance.”
“But really, Maurice, I see no sufficient cause for all this,” said the youth, timidly.
“Look now, Joe,” said the other, drawing his chair closer to him, and talking in the low and measured tone of a confidence,—“look now, you're not going to pass your life as the successor to that excellent man, Dan Nelligan, of Oughterard, selling hides and ropes and ten-penny-nails, and making an estate the way old ladies make a patchwork quilt. You'll be able to start in life with plenty of tin and plenty of talent; you'll have every advantage that money and education can give, and only one drawback on your road to success,—the mere want of blood,—that dash of birth which forms the only real freemasonry in this world. Now mind me, Joe; the next best thing to having this oneself is to live and associate with those who have; for in time, what with catching up their prejudices and learning their ways, you come to feel very much as they do; and, what is better still, they begin to regard you as one of themselves.”
“But if I do not ambition this,—if I even reject it?” said the other, impatiently.
“Then all I say is that Trinity College may make wonderful scholars, but turns out mighty weak men of the world!”
“Perhaps so!” said Nelligan, dryly, and with a half-nettled air.