“He looks as if he would like to lean up against a tree and dream,” said Wally, “and good gracious! is he going to drag the lot of us!”
“Why wouldn’t he?” asked Mr. Burke, with some asperity. “Git along with ye to the ass, John Conolly,”—to the boy—“and lend a hand to the big thrunk when the road does be rough, or it will fall off on ye. Will ye get up, miss?”
“Is it far?” asked Norah, regarding the somnolent horse with troubled eyes.
“ ’Tis five Irish miles, miss.”
“But can he take us all? There’s—there’s so much of us,” said Norah, her glance roving over her tall menfolk, and dwelling finally on Mr. Burke, who was not less tall.
“Him!” said Mr. Burke. “But isn’t the luggage on the ass-cart? Sure it’ll only be a luxury for him—many’s the time I’ve known that one with seven or eight behind him, going to a funeral, and he that full of courage, I’d me own throubles to keep him from bolting? Let ye get up, and ’tis little he’ll be making of ye.”
They got up, unhappily, and Mr. Burke hopped into the driver’s seat—which is occupied only in time of stress, the jarvey greatly preferring to drive from the side. He said, “G’wan, now!” to the little horse, and that animal awoke and took the road gallantly, while a cracked bell on his collar rattled a discordant accompaniment to his hoof-beats.
They jogged on between the high banks. The scent of the whitethorn that made snow upon their crests flooded the air, and mingled with deep wafts of odour from clumps of furze lying golden in the fields. There were other flowers starring the hedges; honeysuckle, waving long arms of sweetness, and, nestling closely in the grass-grown banks, clusters of wild violets, starry celandines and even a few late primroses. There were many houses in sight; little whitewashed cabins scattered over the hills, approached by narrow boreens or tiny lanes, so narrow that it seemed that even an ass-cart could scarcely manage to squeeze in between their towering banks.
“Did you ever see such little paddocks—fields, I ought to say?” uttered Wally. “And the great fat banks and hedges between them! Why, they must cover as much ground as there is in many of the fields!”
“We’d put wire-fences, in Australia,” said Mr. Linton, laughing. “It’s queer, when you come to think of it: we’re supposed to have land to spare, but we put the narrowest fences that can be made; and here, there isn’t enough to go round, and they cover up ever so much of it with their banks.”