CHAPTER I.
THE IRISH AGITATOR MAKES HIS FIRST APPEARANCE "Faith, there's no man says more and knows less than yerself, I'm thinkin'." "About Ireland, yer riverence ?" "And everything else, Mr.O'Connell." "Is that criticism or just temper, Father ?" "It's both, Mr.O'Connell." "Sure it's the good judge ye must be of ignorance, Father Cahill." "And what might that mane ?" "Ye live so much with it, Father." "I'm lookin' at it and listenin' to it now, Frank O'Connell." "Then it's a miracle has happened, Father." "A miracle ?" "To see and hear one's self at the same time is indade a miracle, yer riverence." Father Cahill tightened his grasp on his blackthorn stick, and shaking it in the other's face, said: "Don't provoke the Man of God!" "Not for the wurrld," replied the other meekly, "bein' mesef a Child of Satan." "And that's what ye are.

And ye'd have others like yerself.

But ye won't while I've a tongue in me head and a sthrong stick in me hand." O'Connell looked at him with a mischievous twinkle in his blue-grey eyes: "Yer eloquence seems to nade somethin' to back it up, I'm thinkin'." Father Cahill breathed hard.

He was a splendid type of the Irish Parish-Priest of the old school.

Gifted with a vivid power of eloquence as a preacher, and a heart as tender as a woman's toward the poor and the wretched, he had been for many years idolised by the whole community of the village of M--in County Clare.