Peadar Ua Laoghaire

“ Oh! what an angel she is! What an angel of light she is!"
He remained for a long time thinking of her, of her beautiful face, and of the light that shone from her eyes, and her forehead, and her mouth. He thought of how the light went from her eyes into his own eyes and deep into his head and down into his heart. He remembered the words he had said when he felt the happiness that came upon him, and when he was giving thanks to the Eternal Father for having created her, and to the Only Son for having redeemed her, and to the Holy Ghost for having sanctified her. ”

“ The King's soldiers came, with the Captain at their head, all on horseback, each man wearing a silken cloak, each man's sword hanging down by the flank of his horse, and a fine long spear standing up high in his hand, while the men and women and children of the town crowded and crushed each other, striving to get a view of them.
Sive was with them, and Cormac, driven in a fine coach, with a pair of the King's horses drawing the coach. Sive wore a red cloak, redder far, and finer, than the cloak she had on, that day of the fair. ”

“ It became stronger and stronger until it gathered to itself all the music and all the voices, and swept them round the house as in a whirlpool. Then the thunder grew yet stronger and heavier, and all became more violent—the whirling and the quivering and surging in the wood and in the people's bones—until all the listeners began to feel a palpitation of the heart and a dizziness in the head. ”

“ The greed was too strong in your heart. Sixty pounds for a little shaggy colt without shape or form, with no more breeding in him than an old sheep! Confound you, you miserable, mean little wretch! How finely you can talk!"
"Hush, Sive!" said he of the colt, "don't be uneasy. There have been so many senseless people at this fair to-day that I am quite sure that somewhere among them there will very soon be found a fool who will marry you without a fortune." ”

“ What good is it to me to have a heavy fat purse in my pocket and two hundred pounds in cash, and then for me to go to the fair, and that it should be in the power of every mean little wretch of a thimble-rigger to abuse me before the neighbours, and to call me a 'little yellow shoemaker,' and to reproach me with 'brown patches,' and 'stout awls,' and 'smelly shoes,' and to proclaim it before the whole fair that there wasn't a penny in my pocket? If every man lives up to his bargain, it isn't a child's bargain they usually make. ”

“ What am I to do at all, at all? It is a hard thing to happen to me at the end of my life! Oh! I am ruined! Utterly ruined! What shall I do! What shall I do?"
"Shut your mouth and not be bothering us—that's what you'll do!" said Sive. "It is not you that are at a loss by it, but I. If I get him into my hands I'll tear the eyes out of his head. And now I think of it, what string was tying your tongue," said she to Shiana, "that you didn't speak when we passed you as we went down the fair-green? ”

“ When Shiana saw the change, and when he heard the sound and the power of that roar, swelling and rising, the house whirled about him, a cloud came before his eyes, and he fell like a dead lump on the floor, unconscious and speechless.
Sheila.—Oh, Peg! I see him, I see him! oh! oh! oh!
Peg.—Hush, hush, Sheila dear! What do you see?
Sheila.—Oh, the man with the horns! The man with the horns! What shall I do? What shall I do? Oh!
Kate.—The neighbours will hear her. Hush, Sheila, my darling. ”

“ Surely the world knows he is not bound in the sight of God to fulfil that promise."
"Doubtless," said the priest, "if the promise does exist, he is not bound to fulfil it."
"If it does exist, Father, do you say?" said John. "That implies that you think it does not exist. If it does not exist, oughtn't it to be possible to put a curb on Sive's tongue? If what she is saying is all lies—if she has no claim upon Shiana by right of any promise,—she beats all the women I have ever seen, and Shiana beats all the men I have ever seen." ”

“ May God and Mary prosper him!"
"On my word, Patrick," said Dermot, "I think you are right."
"And the world knows, Dermot," said Patrick, "that you will go down to the city to live with Sive and Cormac in the big house, as soon as the place is ready for you!"
"On my word, Patrick, I don't think I will. I think that what I shall do is just to stay in this old nest, as I am. However big and fine Sheeghy's house may be, I don't think I will go encroaching upon them in it. May be, like the King's house, it might be easier to go into it than to come out of it. ”

“ Kate.—Oh, indeed, Peg, I heard my grandfather say that there used to be people long ago who wouldn't marry any woman, because they used to be married to the God of Glory Himself; and that was the name he called them, Céile Dé.
Sheila.—Why, how could they be married like that? Sure that isn't a marriage.
Kate.—If they were not married how could they be called Céile? Isn't Céile a married man or a married woman? Isn't it, Peg?
Peg.—It is, of course.
Sheila.—But then, Peg, how could a man be married to God? Why, a man couldn't be married except to a woman. ”

“ The longer and the more intently he looked, the more the brow became brighter, and the eyes nobler and more loving, and the mouth sweeter and gentler and more smiling, and her face shone with increasing light, and inspired increasing joy and increasing gladness, as she seemed to be just going to open her mouth to speak to him: until he thought his heart was going out of his breast to her, by the intensity of his happiness and bliss, and love for her. ”

“ When the beggars found the coach going off they raised a shout. It was a loud shout—a powerful, vigorous shout, that would make your ears sing. But from that night to this, no one has been able to make out rightly whether that shout was a shout of derision or a shout of praise.
But it did not matter. Sive did not care which. The man of the colt, or any other man or any woman, could not now say that anyone married her without a fortune. If the shout was a shout of derision she did not grudge them their shouting until morning if it was any satisfaction to their minds. ”

“ Shiana went on up the mountain. When he reached the top he was surprised that he should be so little wearied, although the mountain was so steep. There was a splendid view from the summit. He saw the town, and the fair-green, and Grey Dermot's house, and the widow's house. He saw his own house and John Kittach's house. If the view had been seven times more splendid, it could not have taken the stone out of his chest nor the cloud from over his head. There was a fine big broad plot of moss at the top of the mountain, as dry as a feather-bed, and so soft that one would sink to the knees in it. ”

“ When I saw that you cared just as little for riches as you did for poverty I determined to come at you in another way. I put that other enemy in your way. My knowledge of human nature is wide, and my experience of it is intimate. I have often met a person whom poverty could not bring to harm, and I have often met a person whom wealth could not bring to harm. But I seldom ever met a person whom that other enemy could not take off his feet. That other enemy did not take you off your feet, and that fact has taken me off my feet. I am at a loss to make out what sort of man you are at all. ”

“ She did not stir.
"'Move up, don't be shy,' said the King.
"'Move up, there is nothing to happen you,' said the man with the axe, whispering to her.
"She did nothing at all but to let her cloak fall back down on the floor, and to make one spring at the beard of the big man who was on the King's left, and to begin to tug at the beard, just as she did to the man of the colt the night of the fair. The second pull she made at the beard, it came away in her hands in one piece, beard, hair, gold band and all, and who should she have there alive in the flesh but honest Sheeghy! ”

“ I should have more peace in my life if I had never seen them."
"Many is the good thing you have done with them, which you would not have done if you had never seen them," said she.
"Perhaps some evil has been done which would not have been done if I had never seen them," said he.
"The good is greater than the evil," said she. ”

“ But if a person will be going into haunted places at unseasonable times and through sheer foolhardiness, it is no wonder that he should get something else to mind sometimes. But anyhow, by a side-look that I gave, what should I see but a woman sitting on the other shaft of the cart from me, with her back to me. When I saw her I suppose I must have got a touch of faintness on account of the place being said to be haunted; but whatever it was that came over me it didn't last long. Soon I felt something like a human hand going into my bosom, where I carried whatever little money I had. ”

“ If he had failed to destroy the good of that shilling, ought not I to be able to do further good which he would be unable to destroy? I have the purse. It would be great fun to use his own money to provoke and annoy him. By the deer, that is just what I'll do! He would give seven hundred pounds to destroy the good of a single shilling. I have ten years. Many a shilling and penny and pound I shall be able to give for the Saviour's sake in the course of ten years. He will have hard work trying to spoil all the good. ”