“I have prayed for it,” said Darby in a soliloquy, “and I feel that it has been granted.  Swear information, sir?—­I’ll strive and do betther than that, I hope; I must now take my stand by the Bible, sir; that will be the color I’ll hoist while I live.  In that blessed book I read these words this mornin’, ’love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and parsecute you.’  Sir, when I read these words, I felt them slidin’ into my heart, and I couldn’t help repeatin’ them to myself, ever since—­and, even when Father M’Cabe was playin’ his whip about my ears, I was as hard at work prayin’ for his sowl.”

This, we have no doubt, was perfectly true, only we fear that our blessed convert forgot to state the precise nature and object of the prayer in question, and to mention whether it was to the upper or lower settlement he consigned the soul alluded to.  This Christian spirit of Darby’s, however, was by no means in keeping with that of Mr. Lucre, who never was of opinion, in his most charitable of moods, that the gospel should altogether supersede the law.  On this occasion, especially, he felt an acuteness of anxiety to got the priest within his power, which the spirit of no gospel that ever was written could repress.  M’Cabe and he had never met, or, at least, never spoke; but the priest had, since the commencement of the new movement, sent him a number of the most ludicrous messages, and transmitted to him, for selection, a large assortment of the most comical and degrading epithets.  Here, then, was an opportunity of gratifying his resentment in a Christian and constitutional spirit, and with no obstacle in his way but Darby’s inveterate piety.  This, however, for the sake of truth, he hoped to remove, or so modify, that it would not prevent him from punishing that very disloyal and idolatrous delinquent.

“Those feelings, O’Drive, are all very good and creditable to you, and I am delighted indeed that you entertain them—­but, in the meantime, you owe a duty to society greater than that which you owe to yourself.  This man, this priest—­a huge, ferocious person I understand he is—­has latterly been going about the parish foaming and raging, and seeking whom he can horsewhip.”

“That’s thruth, sir, poor dark hathen—­an’, sir—­jist beggin’ your pardon for one minute, half a minute, sir—­you know we’re desired when an inimy strikes us upon one cheek to turn the other to him; well, as I said, sir, I found myself very Scriptural this whole day, so when he hit me the first welt on this cheek, I turns round the other, an’ now look at the state it’s in, sir—­but that’s not all, sir, he tuck the hint at once, and gave it to me on both sides, till he left me as you see me.  Still, sir, I can forgive him, and I have done it.”

“That, as I said, reflects great credit on your principles—­but, in the meantime, you can still retain these principles and prosecute him.  Your lodging informations against him does not interfere with your own personal forgiveness of him at all—­because it is in behalf of, and for the safety of society that you come forward to prosecute now.”