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“Can ye no’ comprehend. It is no law document; but a ceevil way to make your acquaintance. Sir Marmaduke wad pay his respects to ye.”

“Well, let him come,” said O’Donoghue, laughing; “he’s sure to find me at home. The sheriff takes care of that for him. Mark will be here to-morrow or next day; I hope he won’t come before that.”

“The answer must be a written one,” said M’Nab; “it wad na be polite to gie the flunkie the response.”

“With all my heart, Archy, so that I am not asked to indite it. Miles O’Donoghue are the only words I have written for many a year” – and he added, with a half bitter laugh – “it would have been as well for poor Mark, if I had forgotten even that same.”

Sir Archibald retired to write the answer, with many a misgiving as to the substance of the epistle; for while deeply gratified at heart, that his favourite, Herbert, had acquitted himself so nobly, his own pride was mortified, as he thought over the impressions a visit to the O’Donoghue household might have on the mind of a “haughty Southern,” for such in his soul he believed him.

There was no help for it, however; the advances were made in a spirit so very respectful, every line breathed such an evident desire, on the writer’s part, to be well received, that a refusal, or even a formal acceptance of the proffered visit, was out of the question. His reply, then, accepted the intended honour, with a profession of satisfaction; apologising for his omission in calling on Sir Marmaduke, on the score of ill health, and concluded by a few words about Herbert, for whom many inquiries were made in the letter. This, written in the clear, but quaint, old-fashioned characters of the writer’s time, and signed, “O’Donoghue,” was carefully folded, and enclosed in a large square envelope, and with it in his hand, M’Nab re-entered the breakfast room.

“Wad you like to hear the terms of the response, O’Donoghue, before I seal it up?” asked Sir Archy, with an air of importance.

“No, no; I am sure it’s all right and proper. You mentioned, of course, that Mark was from home, but we were expecting him back every day.”

“I didna make ony remark o’ that kind. I said ye wad be happy to see him, and felt proud at the honour of making acquaintance wi’ him.”

“Damn me if I do, then, Archy,” broke in the old man roughly. “For so great a stickler for truth as yourself, the words were somewhat out of place. I neither feel pride nor honour on the subject. Let it go, however, and there’s an end to it.”

“I’ve despatched a messenger for Roach to Killarney; that bit of a brainless body, Terry, is gone by the mountain road, and we may expect the docter here to-night;” and with these words, Sir Archy departed to send off his epistle; and the O’Donoghue leaned back in his easy chair, sorely wearied and worried by the fatigues of the day.

CHAPTER VIII. THE HOUSE OF SICKNESS

How painfully is the sense of severe illness diffused through every part of a household. How solemn is the influence it sheds on every individual, and every object; the noiseless step, the whispered words, the closed curtains, the interruption to the ordinary avocations of life, or the performance of them in gloom and sadness. When wealth and its appliances exist, these things take all the features of extreme care and solicitude for the sufferer; all the agencies of kindness and skill are brought into active exertion, to minister to the rich man in sickness; but when poverty and its evils are present – when the struggle is against the pressure of want, as well as the sufferings of malady, the picture is indeed a dark one.

The many deficiencies in comfort, which daily habit has learned to overlook, the privations which in the active conflict with the world are forgotten, now, come forth in the solitude of the sick house, to affright and afflict us, and we sorrow over miseries long lost to memory till now.

Never since the fatal illness which left O’Donoghue a widower, had there been any thing like dangerous sickness in the house; and like most people who have long enjoyed the blessings of uninterrupted health, they had no thought for such a calamity, nor deemed it among the contingencies of life. Now, however, the whole household felt the change. The riotous laughter of the kitchen was silenced, the loud speaking hushed, the doors banged by the wind, or the ruder violence of careless hands, were closed noiselessly – every thing betokened that sorrow was there. O’Donoghue himself paced to and fro in the chamber of the old tower, now, stopping to cast a glance down the glen, where he still hoped to see Mark approaching, now, resuming his melancholy walk in sadness of heart.

In the darkened sick-room, and by the bed, sat Sir Archibald, concealed by the curtain, but near enough to give assistance to the sick boy should he need it. He sat buried in his own gloomy thoughts, rendered gloomier, as he listened to the hurried breathings and low mutter-ings of the youth, whose fever continued to increase upon him. The old ill-tempered cook, whose tongue was the terror of the region she dwelt in, sat smoking by the fire, nor noticed the presence of the aged fox hound, who had followed Kerry into the kitchen, and now lay asleep before the fire. Kerry himself ceased to hum the snatches of songs and ballads, by which he was accustomed to beguile the weary day. There was a gloom on every thing, nor was the aspect without doors more cheering. The rain beat heavily in drifts against the windows; the wind shook the old trees violently, and tossed their gnarled limbs in wild confusion, sighing with mournful cadence along the deep glen, or pouring a long melancholy note through the narrow corridors of the old house. The sound of the storm, made more audible by the dreary silence, seemed to weigh down every heart. Even the bare-legged little gossoon, Mickey, who had come over from Father Luke’s with a message, sat mute and sad, and as he moved his naked foot among the white turf ashes, seemed to feel the mournful depression of the hour.

“‘Tis a dreadful day of rain, glory be to God!” said Kerry, as he drew a fragment of an old much-soiled newspaper from his pocket, and took his seat beside the blazing fire. For some time he persevered in his occupation without interruption; but Mrs. Branaghan having apparently exhausted her own reflections, now turned upon him to supply a new batch.

“What’s in the news, Kerry O’Leary? I think ye might as well read it out, as be mumbling it to yourself there,” said she, in a tone seldom disputed in the realm she ruled.

“Musha then,” said Kerry, scratching his head, “the little print bates me entirely; the letters do be so close, they hav’n’t room to stir in, and my eyes is always going to the line above, and the line below, and can’t keep straight in the furrow at all. Come here, Mickey, alanah! ‘tis you ought to be a great scholar, living in the house with his reverence. They tell me,” continued he, in a whisper to the cook – “they tell me, he can sarve mass already.”

Mrs. Branaghan withdrew her dudeen at these words, and gazed at the little fellow with unmixed astonishment, who, in obedience to the summons, took his place beside Kerry’s chair, and prepared to commence his task.

“Where will I begin, sir?”

“Begin at the news, av coorse,” said Kerry, somewhat puzzled to decide what kind of intelligence he most desired. “What’s this here with a large P in the first of it?”

“Prosperity of Ireland, sir,” said the child.

“Ay, read about that, Mickey,” said the cook, resuming her pipe.

With a sing-song intonation, which neither regarded paragraph nor period, but held on equably throughout a column, the little fellow began —

“The prospect of an abundant harvest is now very general throughout the country; and should we have a continuance off the heavenly weather for a week or so longer, we hope the corn will all be saved.”

As the allusion made here by the journalist, was to a period of several years previous, the listeners might be excused for not feeling a perfect concurrence in the statement.’

“Heavenly weather, indeed!” grunted out the cook, as she turned her eyes towards the windows, against which the plashing rain was beating – Mike read on.

“Mr. Foran was stopped last night in Baggot-street, and robbed of his watch and clothes, by four villains who live in Stoney-batter; they are well known, and are advised to take care, as such depredations cannot go long unpunished. The two villains that broke into the house of the Archbishop of Dublin, and murdered the house-maid, will be turned off ‘Lord Temple’s trap,’ on Saturday next; this, will be a lesson to the people about the Cross-Poddle, that we hope may serve to their advantage.”

“Sir Miles M’Shane begs to inform the person who found his shoe-buckle after the last levee, that he will receive one and eight pence reward for the same, by bringing it to No. 2, Ely-place; or if he prefer it, Sir Miles will toss up who keeps the pair. They are only paste, and not diamond, though mighty well imitated.”

“Paste!” echoed Mrs. Branahan; “the lying thieves!” her notions on the score of that material being limited to patties and pie-crusts.

“The ‘Bucks’ are imitating the ladies in all the arts of beautifying the person. – Many were seen painted and patched at the duchess’s last ball. We hope this effeminacy may not spread any farther. – It is Mr. Rigby, and not Mr. Harper, is to have the silk gown. Sir George Rose is to get the red ribbon for his services in North America.”

“A silk gown and a red ribbon!” cried Mrs. Branaghan. “Bad luck to me, but they might be ashamed of themselves.”

“Faix, I never believed what Darby Long said before,” broke in Kerry. “He tould me he saw the bishop of Cork in a black silk petticoat like a famale. Is there no more murders, Mickey?”

“I don’t know, sir, barrin’ they’re in the fashionable intelligence.”

“Well, read on.”

“Donald, the beast, who refused to leave his cell in Trim gaol at the last assizes, and was consequently fired at by a file of infantry, had his leg amputated yesterday by Surgeon Huston of this town, and is doing remarkably well.”

“Where’s the sporting news?” said Kerry. “Is not this it, here?” as he pointed to a figure of a horse above a column.

“Mr. Connolly’s horse, Gabriel, would have been in first, but he stopped to eat Whaley, the jockey, when he fell. The race is to be run again on Friday next. It was Mr. Daly, and not Mr. Crosbie, horse-whipped the attorney over the course last Tuesday. Mr. Crosbie spent the day with the Duke of Leinster, and is very angry at his name being mentioned in the wrong, particularly as he is bound over to keep the peace towards all members of the bar for three years.”

“Captain Heavyside and Mr. Malone exchanged four shots each on the Bull this morning. The quarrel was about racing and politics, and miscellaneous matters.”

“It is rumoured that if the Chief Justice be appointed from England, he will decline giving personal satisfaction to the Master of the Rolls; but we cannot credit the report – ”

“The Carmelites have taken Banelagh-house for a nunnery.”

“That’s the only bit in the paper I’d give the snuff of my pipe for,” said Mrs. Branaghan. “Read it again, acushla.”

The boy re-read the passage.

“Well, well, I wonder if Miss Kate will ever come back again,” said she, in a pause.

“To be sure she will,” said Kerry; “what would hinder her? hasn’t she a fine fortune out of the property? ten thousand, I heerd the master say.”

“Ayeh! sure it’s all gone many a day ago; the sorra taste of a brass farthen’s left for her or any one else. The master sould every stick an’ stone in the place, barrin’ the house that’s over us, and sure that’s all as one as sould too. Ah, then, Miss Kate was the purty child, and had the coaxing ways with her.”

“‘Tis a pity to make her a nun,” said Kerry.

“A pity! why would it be a pity, Kerry O’Leary?” said the old lady, bristling up with anger. “Isn’t the nuns happier, and dacenter, and higher nor other women, with rapscallions for husbands, and villians of all kinds for childher? Is it the likes of ye, or the crayture beside ye, that would teach a colleen the way to heaven? Musha, but they have the blessed times of it – fastin’ and prayin’, and doing all manner of penance, and talking over their sins with holy men.”

“Whisht! what’s that? there’s the bell ringing above stairs,” said Kerry, suddenly starting up and listening. “Ay, there it is again,” and, so saying, he yawned and stretched himself, and after several interjectional grumblings over the disturbance, slowly mounted the stairs towards the parlour.

“Are ye sleepin’ down there, ye lazy deevils?” cried Sir Archy from the landing of the stairs. “Did ye no hear the bell?”

“‘Tis now I heerd it,” said Kerry composedly, for he never vouchsafed the same degree of deference to Sir Archy, he yielded to the rest of the family.

“Go see if there be any lemon’s in the house, and lose no time about it.”

“Faix, I needn’t go far then to find out,” whined Kerry; “the master had none for his punch these two nights; they put the little box into a damp corner, and, sure enough, they had beards on them like Jews, the same lemons, when they went to look for them.”

“Go down then to the woman, M’Kelly’s, in the glen, and see if she hae na some there.”

“Oh murther! murther!” muttered Kerry to himself, as the whistling storm reminded him of the dreadful weather without doors. “‘Tis no use in going without the money,” said he slyly, hoping that by this home-thrust he might escape the errand. “Ye maun tell her to put it in the account, man.” “‘Tis in bad company she’d put it then,” muttered Kerry below his breath, then added aloud – “Sorrow one she’d give, if I hadn’t the sixpence in my hand.”

“Canna ye say it’s no’ for yoursel’, it’s for the house – she wad na refuse that.”

“No use in life,” reiterated he solemnly; “she’s a real naygur, and would, not trust Father Luke with a week’s snuff, and he’s dealt there for sneeshin these thirty years.”

“A weel, a weel,” said M’Nab in a low harsh voice; “the world’s growing waur and waur. Ye maun e’en gie her a shilling, and mind ye get nae bad bawbees in change; she suld gie ye twelve for saxpence.”

Kerry took the money without a word in reply; he was foiled in the plan of his own devising, and with many a self-uttered sarcasm on the old Scotchman, he descended the stairs once more.

“Is Master Herbert worse?” said the cook, as the old huntsman entered the kitchen.

“Begorra he must be bad entirely, when ould Archy would give a shilling to cure him. See here, he’s sending me for lemons down to Mary’s.”

Kerry rung the coin upon the table as if to test its genuiness, and muttered to himself —

“‘Tis a good one, devil a lie in it.”

‘"There’s the bell again; musha, how he rings it.”

This time the voice of Sir Archy was heard in loud tones summoning Kerry to his assistance, for Herbert had become suddenly worse, and the old man was unable to prevent him rising from his bed and rushing from the room.

The wild and excited tones of the youth were mixed with the deeper utterings of the old man, who exerted all his efforts to calm and restrain him as Kerry reached the spot. By his aid the boy was conveyed back to his bed, where, exhausted by his own struggles, he lay without speaking or moving for some hours.

It was not difficult to perceive, however, that this state boded more unfavourably than the former one. The violent paroxysms of wild insanity betokened, while they lasted, a degree of vital energy and force, which now seemed totally to have given way; and although Kerry regarded the change as for the better, the more practised and skilful mind of Sir Archibald drew a far different and more dispiriting augury.

Thus passed the weary hours, and at last the long day began to decline, but still no sign, nor sound, proclaimed the doctor’s coming, and M’Nab’s anxiety became hourly more intense.

“If he come na soon,” said he, after a long and dreary silence, “he need na tak’ the trouble to look at him.”

“‘Tis what I’m thinking too.” said Kerry, with a sententious gravity almost revolting – “when the fingers does be going that way, it’s a mighty bad sign. If I seen the hounds working with their toes, I never knew them recover.”

CHAPTER IX. A DOCTOR’S VISIT

The night was far advanced as the doctor arrived at the O’Donoghue’s house, drenched with rain, and fatigued by the badness of the roads, where his gig was often compelled to proceed for above a mile at a foot pace. Doctor Roach was not in the most bland of tempers as he reached his destination; and, of a verity, his was a nature that stood not in any need of increased acerbity. The doctor was a type of a race at one time very general, but now, it is hard to say wherefore, nearly extinct in Ireland. But so it is; the fruits of the earth change not in course of years more strikingly, than the fashions of men’s minds. The habits, popular enough in one generation, survive as eccentricities in another, and are extinct in a third.

There was a pretty general impression in the world, some sixty or seventy years back, that a member of the medical profession, who had attained to any height in his art, had a perfect right to dispense with all the amenities and courtesies which regulate social life among less privileged persons. The concessions now only yielded to a cook, were then extended to a physician; and in accordance with the privilege by which he administered most nauseous doses to the body, he was suffered to extend his dominion, and apply scarcely more palatable remedies to the minds of his patients. As if the ill-flavoured draughts had tinctured the spirit that conceived them, the tone of his thoughts usually smacked of bitters, until at last he seemed to have realized, in his own person, the conflicting agencies of the pharmacopoeia, and was at once acrid, and pungent, and soporific together.

The College of Physicians could never have reproached Doctor Roach with conceding a single iota of their privileges. Never was there one who more stoutly maintained, in his whole practice through life, the blessed immunity of “the Doctor.” The magic word “Recipe,” which headed his prescriptions, suggested a tone of command to all he said, and both his drugs and dicta were swallowed without remonstrance.

It may not be a flattering confession for humanity, but it is assuredly a true one, that the exercise of power, no matter how humble its sphere, or how limited its range, will eventually generate a tyrannical habit in him who wields it. Doctor Roach was certainly not the exception to this rule. The Czar himself was not more autocrat in the steppes of Russia, than was he in any house where sickness had found entrance. From that hour he planted his throne there. All the caprices of age, all the follies of childhood, the accustomed freedoms of home, the indulgences which grow up by habit in a household, had to give way before a monarch more potent than all, “the Doctor.” Men bore the infliction with the same patient endurance they summoned to sustain the malady. They felt it to be grievous and miserable, but they looked forward to a period of relief, and panted for the arrival of the hour, when the disease and the doctor would take their departure together.

If the delight they experienced at such a consummation was extreme, so to the physician it savoured of ingratitude. “I saved his life yesterday,” saith he, “and see how happy he is, to dismiss me to-day.” But who is ever grateful for the pangs of a toothache? – or what heart can find pleasure in the memory of sententiousness, senna, and low diet?

Never were the blessings of restored health felt with a more suitable thankfulness than by Doctor Roach’s patients. To be free once more from his creaking shoes, his little low dry cough, his harsh accents, his harsher words, his contradictions, his sneers, and his selfishness, shed a halo around recovery, which the friends of the patient could not properly appreciate.

Such was the individual whose rumbling and rattling vehicle now entered the court-yard of Carrig-na-curra, escorted by poor Terry, who had accompanied him the entire way on foot. The distance he had come, his more than doubts about the fee, the severity of the storm, were not the accessories likely to amend the infirmities of his temper; while a still greater source of irritation than all existed in the mutual feeling of dislike between him and Sir Archibald M’Nab. An occasional meeting at a little boarding-house in Killarney, which Sir Archy was in the habit of visiting each summer for a few days – the only recreation he permitted himself – had cultivated this sentiment to such a pitch, that they never met without disagreement, or parted without an actual quarrel. The doctor was a democrat, and a Romanist of the first water; Sir Archy was a member of the Scottish Episcopal Church; and, whatever might have been his early leanings in politics, and in whatever companionship his active years were passed, experience had taught him the fallacy of many opinions, which owe any appearance of truth or stability they possess, to the fact, that they have never advanced beyond the stage of speculative notions, into the realms of actual and practical existence; – but, above all, the prudent Scotchman dreaded the prevalence of these doctrines among young and unsettled minds, ever ready to prefer the short and hazardous career of fortune, to the slow and patient drudgery of daily industry.

If the doctor anticipated but little enjoyment in the society of Sir Archy, neither did the latter hope for any pleasure to himself from Roach’s company. However, as the case of poor Herbert became each hour more threatening, the old man resolved to bury in oblivion every topic of mutual disagreement, and, so long as the doctor remained in the house, to make every possible or impossible concession to conciliate the good-will of one, on whose services so much depended.

“Do ye hear?” cried Roach in a harsh voice to Kerry, who was summoned from the kitchen-fire to take charge of his horse; “let the pony have a mash of bran – a hot mash, and don’t leave him till he’s dry.”

“Never fear, sir,” replied Kerry, as he led the jaded and way-worn beast into the stable, “I’ll take care of him as if he was a racer;” and then, as Roach disappeared, added – “I’d like to see myself strapping the likes of him – an ould mountaineer. A mash of bran, indeed! Cock him up with bran! Begorra, ‘tis thistles and docks he’s most used to;” and, with this sage reflection on the beast’s habits, he locked the stable door, and resumed his former place beside the blazing turf fire.

O’Donoghue’s reception of the doctor was most cordial. He was glad to see him on several accounts. He was glad to see any one who could tell him what was doing in the world, from which all his intercourse was cut off; he was glad, because the supper was waiting an hour and a half beyond its usual time, and he was getting uncommonly hungry; and, lastly, he really felt anxious about Herbert, whenever by any chance his thoughts took that direction.

“How are you, Roach?” cried he, advancing to meet him with an extended hand. “This is a kind thing of you – you’ve had a dreadful day, I fear.”

“D – n me, if I ever saw it otherwise in this confounded glen. I never set foot in it, that I wasn’t wet through.”

“We have our share of rain, indeed,” replied the other, with a good-humoured laugh; “but if we have storm, we have shelter.”

Intentionally misunderstanding the allusion, and applying to the ruined mansion the praise bestowed on the bold mountains, the doctor threw a despairing look around the room, and repeated the word “shelter” in a voice far from complimentary.

The O’Donoghue’s blood was up in a moment. His brow contracted and his cheek flushed, as, in a low and deep tone, he said —

“It is a crazy old concern. You are right enough – neither the walls nor the company within them, are like what they once were.”

The look with which these words were given, recalled the doctor to a sense of his own impertinence; for, like certain tethered animals, who never become conscious of restraint till the check of the rope lays them on their back, nothing short of such a home-blow could have staggered his self-conceit.

“Ay, ay,” muttered he, with a cackling apology for a laugh, “time is telling on us all. – But I’m keeping the supper waiting.”

The duties of hospitality were always enough to make O’Donoghue forget any momentary chagrin, and he seated himself at the table with all his wonted good-humour and affability.

As the meal proceeded, the doctor inquired about the sick boy, and the circumstances attending his illness; the interest he bestowed on the narrative mainly depending on the mention of Sir Marmaduke Travers’s name, whose presence in the country he was not aware of before, and from whose residence he began already to speculate on many benefits to himself.

“They told me,” continued O’Donoghue, “that the lad behaved admirably. In fact, if the old weir-rapid be any thing like what I remember it, the danger was no common one. There used to be a current there strong enough to carry away a dozen horsemen.”

“And how is the young lady? Is she nothing the worse from the cold, and the drenching, and the shock of the accident?”

“Faith, I must confess it, I have not had the grace to ask after her. Living as I have been for some years back, has left me sadly in arrear with every demand of the world. Sir Marmaduke was polite enough to say he’d call on me; but there is a still greater favour he could bestow, which is, to leave me alone.”

“There was a law-suit or dispute of some kind or other between you, was there not?”

“There is something of that kind,” said O’Donoghue, with an air of annoyance at the question; “but these are matters gentlemen leave to their lawyers, and seek not to mix themselves up with.”

“The strong purse is the sinew of war,” muttered the inexorable doctor; “and they tell me he is one of the wealthiest men in England.”

“He may be, for aught I know or care.”

“Well, well,” resumed the other, after a long deliberative pause, “there’s no knowing how this little adventure may turn out. If your son saved the girl’s life, I scarcely think he could press you so hard about – ”

“Take care, sir,” broke in O’Donoghue, and with the words he seized the doctor’s wrist in his strong grasp; “take care how you venture to speak of affairs which no wise concern you;” then, seeing the terrified look his speech called up, he added – “I have been very irritable latterly, and never desire to talk on these subjects; so, if you please, we’ll change the topic.”

The door was cautiously opened at this moment, and Kerry presented himself, with a request from Sir Archibald, that, as soon as Doctor Roach found it convenient, he would be glad to see him in the sick-room.

“I am ready now,” said the doctor, rising from his chair, and not by any means sorry at the opportunity of escaping a tête-a-tête he had contrived to render so unpalatable to both parties. As he mounted the stairs, he continued in broken phrases to inveigh against the house and the host in a half soliloquy – “A tumble-down old barrack it is – not fifty shillings worth of furniture under the roof – the ducks were as tough as soaked parchment – and where’s the fee to come from – I wish I knew that – unless I take one of these old devils instead of it;” and he touched the frame of a large, damp, discoloured portrait of some long-buried ancestor, several of which figured on the walls of the stair-case.

“The boy is worse – far worse,” whispered a low, but distinct voice beside him. “His head is now all astray – he knows no one.”

Doctor Roach seemed vexed at the ceremony of salutation being forgotten in Sir Archibald’s eagerness about the youth, and drily answered —

“I have the honour to see you well, sir, I hope.”

“There is one here very far from well,” resumed Sir Archy, neither caring for, nor considering the speech. “We have lost too much time already – I trust ye may na be too late now.”

The doctor made no reply, but rudely taking the candle from his hand, walked towards the bed —

“Ay, ay,” muttered he, as he beheld the lustrous eyes and widespread pupils – the rose-red cheek, and dry, cracked lips of the youth; “he has it sure enough.”

“Has what? – what is it?”

“The fever – brain fever, and the worst kind of it too.”

“And there is danger then?” whispered M’Nab.

“Danger, indeed! I wonder how many come through it. Pshaw! there’s no use trying to count his pulse;” and he threw the hand rudely back upon the bed. “That’s going as fast as ever his father went with the property.” A harsh, low, cackling laugh followed this brutal speech, which demanded all Sir Archy’s predetermined endurance to suffer unchecked.

“Do you know me?” said the doctor, in the loud voice used to awaken the dormant faculty of hearing. “Do you know me?”

“Yes,” replied the boy, staring steadfastly at him.

“Well, who am I, then? Am I your father?”

A vacant gaze was all the answer.

“Tell me, am I your father?”

No reply followed.

“Am I your uncle, then?” said the doctor, still louder.

The word, “uncle,” seemed to strike upon some new chord of his awakened sense: a faint smile played upon his parched lips, and his eyes wandered from the speaker, as if in search of some object, till they fell upon Sir Archy, as he stood at the foot of the bed, when suddenly his whole countenance was lighted up, and he repeated the word, “uncle,” to himself in a voice indescribably sweet and touching.

“He has na forgotten me,” murmured M’Nab, in a tone of deep emotion. “My ain dear boy – he knows me yet.”

“You agitate him too much,” said Roach, whose nature had little sympathy with the feelings of either. “You must leave me alone here to examine him myself.”

M’Nab said not a word, but, with noiseless step, stole from the room. The doctor looked after him as he went, and then followed to see that the door was closed behind. This done, he beckoned to Kerry, who still remained, to approach, and deliberately seated himself in a chair near the window.