“Now it was plain enough to be seen, that my Lord took this to heart, as well he might, faith; however, he considered that it came from a misfortunate Prince, he let it drop, and so this was all that ever passed between them; however, he was angry enough with his steward, but Measther Clendinning put his comehither on him, and convinced him that the biggest rogue alive was an honest man.”
“And the Prince!” I interrupted eagerly.
“Och, jewel, the prince lives away in the old Irish fashion, only he has not a Christian soul now at all at all, most of the old Milesian gentry having quit the country; besides, the Prince being in a bad state of health, and having nearly lost the use of his limbs, and his heart being heavy, and his purse light; for all that he keeps up the old Irish customs and dress, letting nobody eat at the same table but his daughter, * not even his Lady when she was alive.”
* M’Dermot, Prince of Coolavin, never suffered his wife to
sit at table with him; although his daughter-in-law was
permitted to that honour, as she was the descendant from the
royal family of the O’Connor.
“And do you think the son of Lord M———— would have no chance of obtaining an audience from the Prince?”
“What the young gentleman that they say is come to M———— house? why about as much chance as his father, but by my conscience, that’s a bad one.”
“And your young Princess, is she as implacable as her father?”
“Why, faith! I cannot well tell you what the Lady Glorvina is, for she is like nothing upon the face of God’s creation but herself. I do not know how it comes to pass, that every mother’s soul of us loves her better nor the Prince; ay, by my conscience, and fear her too; for well may they fear her, on the score of her great learning, being brought up by Father John, the chaplain, and spouting Latin faster nor the priest of the parish: and we may well love her, for she is a saint upon earth, and a great physicianer to boot; curing all the sick and maimed for twenty miles round. Then she is so proud, that divil a one soul of the quality will she visit in the whole barony, though she will sit in a smoky cabin for hours together, to talk to the poor: besides all this, she will sit for hours at her Latin and Greek, after the family are gone to bed, and yet you will see her up with the dawn, running like a doe about the rocks; her fine yellow hair streaming in the wind, for all the world like a mermaid.
“Och! my blessing light on her every day she sees the light, for she is the jewel of a child.”
“A child! say you!”