“Five guineas a head!—pray who told you so?”
“Faitha, sir, I couldn't exactly say, but every one says it. It's said we're to get five guineas a head, sir, and be provided for afther; I have nine o' them, sir, eight crathurs and Biddy herself—she can't spake English, but, wid the help o' God, I could consthre it for her. Faith, she'd make a choice Prodestan, sir, for wanst she takes a thing into her head the devil wouldn't get it out. As for me, I don't want a promise at all, your reverence, barrin' that if it 'ud be plaisin' to you, jist to lay your forefinger along your nose—merely to show that we undherstand one another—it 'ud be as good to me as the bank. The crathur on the breast, your reverence, we'd throw in as a luck penny, or dhuragh, and little Paddy we give at half price.”
“Did you hear all this?”
“Faitha, then, we did, sir—and sure, as you don't like to have the thing known, I can keep my tongue atween my teeth as well as e'er a convart livin'—an' as for Biddy, by only keepin' her from the dhrink, she's as close as the gate of heaven to a heretic. Bedad, sir, this new light bates everything.”
“My good friend, Cummins, I tell you I have no money to give,—neither is there anything to be given,—for the sake of conversion—but, if your notions of your own religion are unsettled, put yourself under Lord ———'s chaplain; and, if, in the due course of time, he thinks you sufficiently improved to embrace our faith, you and your family may be aided by some comforts suitable to your condition.”
Cummins' face lengthened visibly at 'an intimation which threw him so far from his expectations; the truth being, that he calculated upon receiving the money the moment he read his recantation. He looked at Mr. Lucre again as significantly as he could—gave his head a scratch of remonstrance—shrugged himself as before—rubbed his elbow—turned round his hat slowly, examined its shape, and gave it a smarter set, after which he gave a dry hem and prepared to speak.
“I'll hear nothing further on the subject,” said the other, “withdraw.”
Without more ado Cummins slunk out of the room, highly disappointed, but still not without hopes from Lord ———, to whom, or his chaplain, he resolved to apply. In the meantime he made the best of his way home to his starving wife and children, without having communicated the result of his visit to those who were assembled at the glebe house.
He had scarcely left the hall door when another claimant for admission presented himself in the person of a huge, tattered fellow, with red, stiff hair standing up like reeds through the broken crown of his hat, which he took off on entering. This candidate for Protestantism had neither shoe nor stocking on him, but stalked in, leaving the prints of his colossal feet upon the hall through which he passed.
“Well, friend, what is wrong with you?—why did'nt you rub your filthy feet, sir, before you entered the room? You have soiled all my carpet.”