“I will that,” said Mrs. Fitzpatrick with emphasis.  “Where was I?  The man an’ his childer.  Sure, I’ll tell Yer ’Anner.”  Here she turned to the judge.  “Fer he,” with a jerk of her thumb towards the lawyer, “knows nothin’ about the business at all, at all.  It was wan night he came to me house askin’ to see his childer.  The night o’ the dance, Yer ‘Anner.  As I was sayin’, he came to me house where the childer was, askin’ to see thim, an’ him without a look o’ thim fer years.  An’ did they know him?” Mrs. Fitzpatrick’s voice took a tragic tone.  “Not a hair av thim.  Not at the first.  Ah, but it was the harrt-rendin’ scene, with not a house nor a home fer him to come till, an’ him sendin’ the money ivery month to pay fer it.  But where it’s gone, it’s not fer me to say.  There’s some in this room” (here she regarded Rosenblatt with a steady eye) “might know more about that money an’ what happened till it, than they know about Hivin.  Ah, but as I was sayin’, it wud melt the harrt av a Kerry steer, that’s first cousin to the goats on the hills fer wildness, to see the way he tuk thim an’ held thim, an’ wailed over thim, the tinder harrt av him!  Fer only wan small hour or two could he shtay wid thim, an’ then aff to that haythen counthry agin that gave him birth.  An’ the way he suffered fer that same, poor dear!  An’ the beautiful wife he lost!  Hivin be kind to her!  Not her,” following the judge’s glance toward Paulina, “but an angel that need niver feel shame to shtand befure the blissid Payther himsilf, wid the blue eyes an’ the golden hair in the picter he carries nixt his harrt, the saints have pity on him!  An’ how he suffered fer the good cause!  Och hone! it breaks me harrt!” Here Mrs. Fitzpatrick paused to wipe away her tears.

“But, Mrs. Fitzpatrick,” interrupted Mr. Staunton, “this is all very fine, but what has this to do—­”

“Tut! man, isn’t it that same I’m tellin’ ye?” And on she went, going back to the scene she had witnessed in her own room between Kalmar and his children, and describing the various dramatis personae and the torrential emotions that had swept their hearts in that scene of final parting between father and children.

Again and again Staunton sought to stay her eloquence, but with a majestic wave of her hand she swept him aside, and with a wealth of metaphor and an unbroken flow of passionate, tear-bedewed rhetoric that Staunton himself might well envy, she held the court under her sway.  Many of the women present were overcome with emotion.  O’Hara openly wiped away his tears, keeping an anxious eye the while upon the witness and waiting the psychological moment for the arresting of her tale.

The moment came when Mrs. Fitzpatrick’s emotions rendered her speechless.  With a great show of sympathy, Mr. O’Hara approached the witness, and offering her a glass of water, found opportunity to whisper, “Not another word, on your soul.”

“Surely,” he said, appealing to the judge in a voice trembling with indignant feeling, “my learned friend will not further harass this witness.”