statement required, as it was intended to require, elucidation,
so Mick proceeded to announce: "It's himself's off to Fortbrack
a-Monday, 'listin' he'll be in the Edenderry Light Infantry; so the
next time we set eyes on him it's blazin' along the street we'll
see him, like the boys we had here yisterday."

"Ah! sure now, that'll be grand," said Mrs. Doherty, unwarily
complaisant; "we'll all be proud to behold him that way. 'T is a
fine thing far any young man who's got a fancy to take up wid it."

"Och, then, bedad it is so!" said Mick, with emphasis, promptly
making for the opening given to him.

"Bedad it is," said Paddy.

"There's nothin' like it," said Mick.

"Ah, nothin' at all," said Paddy.

Mrs. Doherty made no remark as she twisted a dripping apron into
a sausage-shaped roll to wring the water out.

"How much was it you were sayin' you'd have in the week, Paddy,
just to put in your pocket for your divarsion like?" inquired Mick,
with a convenient lapse of memory.

"Och, seven or eight shillin's anyway," said Paddy, in the tone of
one to whom shillings had already become trivial coins; "and that,
mind you, after you've ped for the best of aitin' and dhrinkin',
and your kit free, and no call to be spendin' another penny unless