Protestant friends on a Friday. Our Phineas, however, did not turn
Protestant up in Dublin, whatever his father's secret wishes on that
subject may have been. He did join a debating society, to success
in which his religion was no bar; and he there achieved a sort of
distinction which was both easy and pleasant, and which, making
its way down to Killaloe, assisted in engendering those ideas as
to swanhood of which maternal and sisterly minds are so sweetly
susceptible. "I know half a dozen old windbags at the present
moment," said the doctor, "who were great fellows at debating clubs
when they were boys." "Phineas is not a boy any longer," said Mrs.
Finn. "And windbags don't get college scholarships," said Matilda
Finn, the second daughter. "But papa always snubs Phinny," said
Barbara, the youngest. "I'll snub you, if you don't take care," said
the doctor, taking Barbara tenderly by the ear;--for his youngest
daughter was the doctor's pet.

The doctor certainly did not snub his son, for he allowed him to go
over to London when he was twenty-two years of age, in order that he
might read with an English barrister. It was the doctor's wish that
his son might be called to the Irish Bar, and the young man's desire
that he might go to the English Bar. The doctor so far gave way,
under the influence of Phineas himself, and of all the young women of
the family, as to pay the usual fee to a very competent and learned
gentleman in the Middle Temple, and to allow his son one hundred and
fifty pounds per annum for three years. Dr. Finn, however, was still
firm in his intention that his son should settle in Dublin, and take
the Munster Circuit,--believing that Phineas might come to want home
influences and home connections, in spite of the swanhood which was
attributed to him.