short, light chestnut-tinted hair, blue eyes, and a mouth perfect as
that of Phoebus. He was clever, too, though perhaps not educated as
carefully as might have been: his speech was usually rapid, hearty,
and short, and not seldom caustic and pointed. Had he fallen among
good hands, he might have done very well in the world's fight; but
with such a character, and lacking such advantages, it was quite as
open to him to do ill. Alas! the latter chance seemed to have fallen
to him.

For the first year of his residence at Hap House, he was popular
enough among his neighbours. The Hap House orgies were not commenced
at once, nor when commenced did they immediately become a subject of
scandal; and even during the second year he was
tolerated;--tolerated by all, and still flattered by some.

Among the different houses in the country at which he had become
intimate was that of the Countess of Desmond. The Countess of
Desmond did not receive much company at Desmond Court. She had not
the means, nor perhaps the will, to fill the huge old house with
parties of her Irish neighbours--for she herself was English to the
backbone. Ladies of course made morning calls, and gentlemen too,
occasionally; but society at Desmond Court was for some years pretty
much confined to this cold formal mode of visiting. Owen Fitzgerald,
however, did obtain admittance into the precincts of the Desmond
barracks.

He went there first with the young earl, who, then quite a boy, had
had an ugly tumble from his pony in the hunting-field. The countess
had expressed herself as very grateful for young Fitzgerald's care,
and thus an intimacy had sprung up. Owen had gone there once or