“Why, Docthor,” said Andy, “do you really believe I'll go downwards?”
“Ah, Mr. Morrow, don't ask me that question—out of the pale, you know—out of the pale.”
“Then you think, sir, there's no chance for me, at all?” said Andy, smiling.
“Not the laste, Andy, you must go this way,” said Father Ned, striking the floor with the butt end of his whip, and winking—“to the lower raigons; and, upon my knowledge, to tell you the truth, I'm sorry for it, for you're a worthy fellow.”
“Ah, Docthor,” said Ned, “it's a great thing entirely to be born of the true church—one's always sure, then.”
“Ay, ay; you may say that, Ned,” returned the priest, “come or go what will, a man's always safe at the long run, except he dies without his clargy.—Shane, hand me the jug, if you please.—Where did you get this stuff, Nancy?—faith, it's excellent.”
“You forget, Father Ned, that that's a secret.——But here's Biddy with the eggs, and now you'll have your rasher in no time.”
When the two clergymen had discussed the rashers and eggs, and while the happy group were making themselves intimately acquainted with a fresh jug of punch, as it circulated round the table—
“Now, sir,” said Father Ned to the stranger, “we'll hear your story with the greatest satisfaction possible; but I think you might charge your tumbler before you set to it.”
When the stranger had complied with this last hint, “Well, gentlemen,” said he, “as I am rather fatigued, will you excuse me for the position I am about to occupy, which is simply to stretch myself along the hob here, with my head upon the straw hassoch? and if you have no objection to that, I will relate the story.”