“Ay, headache—­was it? (heartache, rather.  The villain.) Well come, let me have a cup of tea and a mouthful of that toast.”

“Will you not have some chicken, sir?”

“No, my dear—­no; just what I said—­a mouthful of toast, and a cup of tea, with plenty of cream in it.  Thank you, love. (A good swing for him will be delightful.  I’ll go to see it.) Helen, my dear, I’m going to give a dinner-party next week.  Of course we’ll have your future—­hem—­I mean we’ll have Sir Robert, and—­let me see—­who else?  Why, Oxley, the sheriff”, Mr. Brown, the parson—­I wish he didn’t lean so much to the cursed Papists, though—­Mr. Hastings, who is tarred with the same stick, it is whispered.  Well, who next?  Lord Deilmacare, a good-natured jackass—­a fellow who would eat a jacketful of carrion, if placed before him, with as much gout as if it were venison.  He went home one night, out of this, with the parson’s outside coat and shovel hat upon him, and did not return them for two days.”

“Does this habit proceed from stupidity, papa?”

“Not at all; but from mere carelessness.  The next two days he was out with his laborers, and if a cow or pig chanced—­(the villain! we’ll hang him to a certainty)—­chanced, I say, to stray into the field, he would shy the shovel hat at them, without remorse.  Oh! we must have him, by all means.  But who next?  Sir Jenkins Joram.  Give him plenty to drink, and he is satisfied.”

“But what are his political principles, papa?”

“They are to be found in the bottle, Helen, which is the only creed, political or religious, to which I ever knew him to be attached; and I tell you, girl, that if every Protestant in Ireland were as deeply devoted to his Church as he is to the bottle, we would soon be a happy people, uncorrupted by treacherous scoundrels, who privately harbor Papists and foster Popery itself. (The infernal scoundrel.)”

“But, papa,” replied his daughter, with a melancholy smile, “I think I know some persons, who, although very loud and vehement in their outcry against Popery, have, nevertheless, on more than one or two occasions, harbored Papists in their house, and concealed even priests, when the minions of the law were in search of them.”

“Yes, and it is of this cursed crew of hollow Protestants that I now speak—­ahem—­ay—­ha—­well, what the devil—­hem.  To be sure I—­I—­I—­but it doesn’t signify; we can’t be wise at all times.  But after all, Helen (she has me there), after all, I say, there are some good Papists, and some good—­ahem—­priests, too.  There now, I’ve got it out.  However, Helen, those foolish days are gone, and we have nothing for it now but to hunt Popery out of the country.  But to proceed as to the dinner.”

“I think Popery is suffering enough, sir, and more than enough.”

“Ho, ho,” he exclaimed with triumph, “here comes the next on my list—­a fine fellow, who will touch it up still more vigorously—­I mean Captain Smellpriest.”