say it was eddication."

When the sets, which are very long and very decorous, are finished,
sometimes a jig is danced for our benefit. The spectators make a

ring, and the chosen dancers go into the middle, where their steps
are watched by a most critical and discriminating audience with the

most minute and intense interest. Our Molly is one of the best jig
dancers among the girls here (would that she were half as clever at

cooking!); but if you want to see an artist of the first rank, you
must watch Kitty O'Rourke, from the neighbouring village of

Dooclone. The half door of the barn is carried into the ring by one
or two of her admirers, whom she numbers by the score, and on this

she dances her famous jig polthogue, sometimes alone and sometimes
with Art Rooney, the only worthypartner for her in the kingdom of

Kerry. Art's mother, 'Bid' Rooney, is a keen matchmaker, and we
heard her the other day advising her son, who was going to Dooclone,

to have a 'weeny court' with his colleen, to put a clane shirt on
him in the middle of the week, and disthract Kitty intirely by

showin' her he had three of thim, annyway!
Kitty is a beauty, and doesn't need to be made 'purty wid cows'--a

feat that the old Irishman proposed to do when he was consummating a
match for his plain daughter. But the gifts of the gods seldom come

singly, and Kitty is well fortuned as well as beautiful; fifty
pounds, her own bedstead and its fittings, a cow, a pig, and a web

of linen are supposed to be the dazzling total, so that it is small
wonder her deluderin' ways are maddening half the boys in

Ballyfuchsia and Dooclone. She has the prettiest pair of feet in
the County Kerry, and when they are encased in a smart pair of

shoes, bought for her by Art's rival, the big constable from
Ballyfuchsia barracks, how they do twinkle and caper over that half

barn door, to be sure! Even Murty, the blind fiddler, seems
intoxicated by the plaudits of the bystanders, and he certainly

never plays so well for anybody as for Kitty of the Meadow.
Blindness is still common in Ireland, owing to the smoke in these

wretched cabins, where sometimes a hole in the roof is the only
chimney; and although the scores of blind fiddlers no longer

traverse the land, finding a welcome at all firesides, they are
still to be found in every community. Blind Murty is a favourite

guest at the Rooney's cabin, which is never so full that there is
not room for one more. There is a small wooden bed in the main

room, a settle that opens out at night, with hens in the straw
underneath, where a board keeps them safely within until they have

finished laying. There are six children besides Art, and my
ambition is to photograph, or, still better, to sketch the family

circle together; the hens cackling under the settle, the pig ('him
as pays the rint') snoring in the doorway, as a proprietor should,

while the children are picturesquely grouped about. I never
succeed, because Mrs. Rooney sees us as we turn into the lane, and

calls to the family to make itself ready, as quality's comin' in
sight. The older children can scramble under the bed, slip shoes

over their bare feet, and be out in front of the cabin without the
loss of a single minute. 'Mickey jew'l,' the baby, who is only

four, but 'who can handle a stick as bould as a man,' is generally
clad in a ragged skirt, slit every few inches from waist to hem, so

that it resembles a cotton fringe. The little coateen that tops
this costume is sometimes, by way of diversion, transferred to the

dog, who runs off with it; but if we appear at this unlucky moment,
there is a stylish yoke of pink ribbon and soiled lace which one of

the girls pins over Mickey jew'l's naked shoulders.
Moya, who has this eye for picturesquepropriety, is a great friend

of mine, and has many questions about the Big Country when we take
our walks. She longs to emigrate, but the time is not ripe yet.

"The girls that come back has a lovely style to thim," she says
wistfully, "but they're so polite they can't live in the cabins anny

more and be contint." The 'boys' are not always so improved, she
thinks. "You'd niver find a boy in Ballyfuchsia that would say

annything rude to a girl; but when they come back from Ameriky, it's
too free they've grown intirely." It is a dull life for them, she

says, when they have once been away; though to be sure Ballyfuchsia
is a pleasanter place than Dooclone, where the priest does not

approve of dancing, and, however secretly you may do it, the curate
hears of it, and will speak your name in church.

It was Moya who told me of Kitty's fortune. "She's not the match
that Farmer Brodigan's daughter Kathleen is, to be sure; for he's a

rich man, and has given her an iligant eddication in Cork, so that
she can look high for a husband. She won't be takin' up wid anny of

our boys, wid her two hundred pounds and her twenty cows and her
pianya. Och, it's a thriminjus player she is, ma'am. She's that

quick and that strong that you'd say she wouldn't lave a string on
it."

Some of the young men and girls never see each other before the
marriage, Moya says. "But sure," she adds shyly, "I'd niver be

contint with that, though some love matches doesn't turn out anny
better than the others."

"I hope it will be a love match with you, and that I shall dance at
your wedding, Moya," I say to her smilingly.

"Faith, I'm thinkin' my husband's intinded mother died an old maid
in Dublin," she answers merrily. "It's a small fortune I'll be

havin' and few lovers; but you'll be soon dancing at Kathleen
Brodigan's wedding, or Kitty O'Rourke's, maybe."

I do not pretend to understand these humbleromances, with their
foundations of cows and linen, which are after all no more sordid

than bank stock and trousseaux from Paris. The sentiment of the
Irish peasant lover seems to be frankly and truly expressed in the

verses:-
'Oh! Moya's wise and beautiful, has wealth in plenteous store,

And fortune fine in calves and kine, and lovers half a score;
Her faintest smile would saints beguile, or sinners captivate,

Oh! I think a dale of Moya, but I'll surely marry Kate.
. . . . .

'Now to let you know the raison why I cannot have my way,
Nor bid my heart decide the part the lover must obey-

The calves and kine of Kate are nine, while Moya owns but
eight,

So with all my love for Moya I'm compelled to marry Kate!'
I gave Moya a lace neckerchief the other day, and she was rarely

pleased, running into the cabin with it and showing it to her mother
with great pride. After we had walked a bit down the boreen she

excused herself for an instant, and, returning to my side, explained
that she had gone back to ask her mother to mind the kerchief, and

not let the 'cow knock it'!
Lady Kilbally tells us that some of the girls who work in the mills

deny themselves proper food, and live on bread and tea for a month,
to save the price of a gay ribbon. This is trying, no doubt, to a

philanthropist, but is it not partly a starved sense of beauty
asserting itself? If it has none of the usual outlets, where can

imagination express itself if not in some paltry thing like a
ribbon?

Chapter XIV. Mrs. Mullarkey's iligant locks.
'Where spreads the beautiful water to gay or cloudy skies,

And the purple peaks of Killarney from ancient woods arise.'
William Allingham.

Mrs. Mullarkey cannot spoil this paradise for us. When I wake in
the morning, the fuchsia-tree outside my window is such a glorious

mass of colour that it distracts my eyes from the unwashed glass.
The air is still; the mountains in the far distance are clear

purple; everything is fresh washed and purified for the new day.
Francesca and I leave the house sleeping, and make our way to the

bogs. We love to sit under a blossoming sloe-bush and see the