"No, no; you are altogether mistaken," was the chilly reply; "I am content to read books, without having the ambition to write them."
"Well, then, the greater compliment to us poor Irish that such an independent inquirer should come amongst us," said Hennessey. "I hope you are satisfied with what you have observed."
"I do not wish to answer your question, sir, since, without intending it, I might give you offence," was the guarded reply.
"Pray don't spare me, young gentleman," sneered the agent, "as I am used to misconstruction, and have shoulders broad enough to bear it. You find fault with my management, of course?"
"Not of course, sir," replied Redland, "but if you insist on having my opinion, I think that Sir William Jessop's estates are very wretchedly managed indeed."
"Hah! that is candor with a vengeance!" said the agent, startled out of his self-possession; "you must be a disinterested observer to jump at once to so decided a conclusion."
"I had my eyes and ears, sir, and made use of them," answered the composed stranger; "where everything is miserable, and everybody wretched, on an estate which pays eight or ten thousand a year to its owner, somebody must be to blame, since there can be no possible cause for it."
"Go on, sir, go on," said the agent, winking at Sir Brian.
"At your invitation, I will, sir," was the cool reply. "Seeing what I have seen, and hearing what I have heard, I do not wonder that discontent and disaffection should prevail amongst men whom no industry can raise, and no good conduct can protect. It is the skeletons of a population that I have been among, and not men and women of flesh and blood; and as to their homes, I profess that the snow-hut of an Esquimaux would be less inhabitable. I shall call Sir William Jessop a bad Englishman, and a worse Christian, if he shall persist in sanctioning a state of things, which, of course, must be out of your control, since I presume you act according to your orders, and cannot help witnessing the terrible miseries which you are every day compelled to increase."