"And what do you want now, Bridget?"

"What is it I'm wanting? just a thrifle of money then to get a sup
of milk for thim five childher as is starving and dying for the want
of it." And she pointed to the wretched, naked brood around her with
a gesture which in spite of her ugliness had in it something of
tragic grandeur.

"But you know that we will not give money. They will take you in at
the poorhouse at Kanturk."

"Is it the poorhouse, yer honor?"

"Or, if you get a ticket from your priest they will give you meal
twice a week at Clady. You know that. Why do you not go to Father
Connellan?"

"Is it the mail? An' shure an' haven't I had it the last month past;
nothin' else; not a taste of a piaty or a dhrop of milk for nigh a
month, and now look at the childher. Look at them, my lady. They are
dyin' by the very road-side. And she undid the bundle at her back,
and laying the two babes down on the road, showed that the elder of
them was in truth in a fearful state. It was a child nearly two
years of age. but its little legs seemed to have withered away; its
cheeks were wan, and yellow and sunken, and the two teeth which it
had already cut were seen with terrible plainness through its
emaciated lips. Its head and forehead were covered with sores; and
then the mother, moving aside the rags, showed that its back and
legs were in the same state. "Look to that," she said, almost with
scorn. "That's what the mail has done--my black curses be upon it,