“What's your object in learning Latin?”
“To be a priest, wid the help o' God; an' to rise my poor father an' mother out of their poverty.”
His companion, after hearing this reply, bent a glance upon him, that indicated the awakening of an interest in the lad much greater than he probably otherwise would have felt.
“It's only of late,” continued the boy, “that my father an' mother got poor; they were once very well to do in the world. But they were put out o' their farm in ordher that the agint might put a man that had married a get (* A term implying illegitimacy) of his own into it. My father intended to lay his case before Colonel B———, the landlord; but he couldn't see him at all, bekase he never comes near the estate. The agint's called Yallow Sam, sir; he's rich through cheatery an' dishonesty; puts money out at intherest, then goes to law, an' brakes the people entirely; for, somehow, he never was known to lose a lawsuit at all, sir. They say it's the divil, sir, that keeps the lawyers on his side; an' that when he an' the lawyers do be dhrawin' up their writins, the devil—God betune me an' harm!—does be helpin' them!”
“And is Colonel B——— actually—or, rather, was he your father's landlord?”
“He was, indeed, sir; it's thruth I'm tellin' you.”
“Singular enough! Stand beside me here—do you see that large house to the right among the trees?”
“I do, sir; a great big house, entirely—like a castle, sir.”
“The same. Well, that house belongs to Colonel B———, and I am very intimate with him. I am Catholic curate of this parish; and I was, before my ordination, private tutor in his family for four years.”
“Maybe, sir, you might have intherest to get my father back into his farm?”