Various

“ Every one thought it strange that such a good practical farmer and shrewd man-of-the-world as Peter Kavanagh should care so little about the comforts or conveniences of every-day existence—but so it was. ”

“ It is true that I have made an important discovery—that I have gained possession of a secret which mankind would give worlds to possess; but I owe too little gratitude to any member of the human race to be induced to part with it. ”

“ They drank to frightful excess whenever they had the slightest opportunity. No one ever saw them for twenty minutes at a time without having full proof that they were slaves to as odious and disgusting a tyranny as ever the depraved tastes of human creatures created for mankind—I mean, no one ever saw them for so long a time without a tobacco pipe between their teeth, and surrounded by every one of the usual nastinesses which accompany the practice when carried to a hateful extent ”

“ Things soiled were never cleaned—things broken were never mended—things lost were never replaced. Each of the family felt in turn the inconvenience of this state of things, but one threw the blame upon the other, and nothing was done to remedy the evil. ”

“ The devil surely has those in his clutches who find comfort and consolation in the visible abandonment of the fair and innocent to the miserable pleasures for which they have sold their own souls. At length she was frightened to perceive that Gerald had grown hardy and boastful of his feat—he had asked for more whisky, and had been given it by Dick, who, half drunk himself already, was determined to make Gerald drunk for once in his life. ”

“ My ambitious parent, infatuated with the admiration and assiduity of her numerous suitors, despised them all, and falling a victim to her vanity, suffered herself to be seduced from the paths of propriety by a designing young pointer, who threw himself in her way, and employed every artifice, until at length he induced her to elope with him from her master’s comfortable farm-yard. ”

“ Yet the same man who will punish us for a trifling theft, will not hesitate to wrong or murder his neighbour for a few worthless, perishable pieces of yellow metal. Oh, destiny, how I thank thee, despite my sufferings, that I was not born a man! What sordid, selfish wretches these men are! Their thoughts from morning until night are occupied with speculations intended to promote their own comfort, their own aggrandizement. The dog alone loves his master better than himself, and will lay down his life in his defence. Man is a base, selfish wretch. ”

“ None of the three sons of Peter Kavanagh had ever before been known to have absented himself from Sunday mass, and their absence on that most holy day was of course a subject of much wonder.
“I could not have thought it possible,” said James Kavanagh gravely, “that they could become so wicked all at once—God forgive them! God help them!”
“Oh, uncle!” cried Alice, as they came in view of the house of guilt once more, “they are not up yet! ”

“ As long as plants are exposed to the light of the sun, their green parts liberate none of this gas.
We have mentioned that when the ascending sap arrives into the leaves, it not only throws off superfluous water and carbonic acid, but likewise derives an additional quantity of nutriment from the atmosphere. The presence of light is necessary for this latter circumstance to take place. The nutriment which, under the influence of sunlight, it acquires from this source, is a substance named “carbon;” this substance is a constituent of carbonic acid, which is indeed composed of carbon and oxygen ”

“ You may know one of these unhappy beings, especially if he be a very young man, by the sullen and dogged air with which, early in the morning, he enters the public house, and sits down in solitude and silence to his double-shotted measure of undiluted whisky—whisky is the only drink for one of this calibre—alas! the worst and fiercest stuff that can be made is the most acceptable to him—his palate is too long palled to distinguish between tastes and flavours—it is the liquid fire he wants ”

“ He was never seen with a pipe in his mouth, or a tattered “racing calendar” sticking out of his pocket; and while his brothers were out upon their sporting expeditions, or amusing themselves in a less innocent way, it was poor Gerald’s pleasure to scamper across the fields to his uncle James’s garden, and walk, or talk, or read, or play with his pretty little sister Alley, or romp with his pretty little cousins Bill and Bess, and Peter and Dick, after school hours—the time he knew he would find most company looking out for him. ”

“ Scenery such as this, the proud Briton will most probably think the exclusive boast of his own favoured isle. He will not imagine that it is also to be found in equal perfection in Ireland, and even within a short distance of the metropolis. It is not in the Guide or Tour Book, and is but little known even to the well informed of the citizens of Dublin themselves, more of whom have seen and enjoyed the scenery of the Thames than that of the Boyne, which is within four hours’ journey. ”

“ Verily, the Spartan nobles, who exhibited the drunken slave before their children, and then placed the wine-cup within their reach, had a better knowledge of human nature than the Irish father who would exorcise the demon of alcohol out of his children by pledges of abstinence, or threats of punishment, while, in the security of his own experience, he feels he can temperately enjoy the luxury of spirituous drink. ”

“ Alley and he were as fond as they could be of each other, and not the less so because they did not live entirely together. “Absence makes the heart grow fonder,” is as true a line as ever was penned, whether we apply it to the lover and his mistress, or the brother and his distant sister. ”

“ Now, the same means which revealed to us the uses of the ascending sap, will also tell us how far the elaborated sap is concerned in vegetable nutrition. In the dark no sap is elaborated, and no vegetable fibre is developed. Are we not therefore justified in supposing that vegetable fibre is formed out of this elaborated sap? Again, let our readers call to their remembrance the experiment of tying a ligature around a branch: in that experiment not only does a considerable swelling take place above the ligature, but from this swollen portion cereal roots frequently protrude. ”

“ The wife and family of the progressive or occasional drunkard are wretched enough as every body knows; but, oh! who can possibly estimate the amount of misery which the wife and children of a madman like this are destined to endure. ”

“ Hypocrisy.—Hypocrisy is, of all vices, the most hateful to man; because it combines the malice of guilt with the meanness of deception. Of all vices it is the most dangerous; because its whole machinery is constructed on treachery, through the means of confidence, on compounding virtue with vice, on making the noblest qualities of our nature minister to the most profligate purposes of our ruin. ”

“ A great many compound products are obtained from the vegetable kingdom. We need merely recall to the reader’s recollection starch, resin, camphor, bland and aromatic oils, bitter principles, colouring matters, the acids of the grape, the lemon, and the apple, &c. to assure him of this truth. All these different substances form themselves out of the sugar and gum of the ascending sap, together with the carbon absorbed under the influence of light. ”

“ But there is another class of drunkards—God forbid that I should attribute any thing to the decrees of Providence inconsistent with mercy and justice—but I am almost tempted to designate this class the drunkards by necessity. However worldly condition, education, or other causes, may modify the result in individual cases, it is not the less certain that there are persons—very many of them—who appear to have come into the world predisposed to an inordinate desire for intoxicating liquors. ”

“ The portion of the descending sap which serves for the growth of the vegetable, exudes in ordinary trees between the bark and the wood, forming a glutinous layer which separates these organs, and is the cause of the facility with which in autumn the bark can be detached from the stem: this portion is called cambium. In palms, and other trees of warm climates, there is no bark, and in such vegetables the nutritive part of the descending sap passes down through the centre of the stem. ”

“ These drops are not observed during the day, because the temperature is then commonly so high as to evaporate them as fast as they are transuded; but the fact is, that plants actually give off much more water during the day than night. The escape of carbonic acid is not so easily detected as that of water; it can, however, be proved, through the resources of chemistry. Unlike water, which is liberated both night and day, and indeed in greatest quantity during the latter period of time, carbonic acid is found to be disengaged during the night only. ”

“ But though the existing ruins of the Church of Donaghmore sufficiently indicate it to have been a structure “diminutive in size,” its architectural features clearly prove that it is not the original church of St Patrick’s erection, but a re-edification of the thirteenth century, in the usual style of the parish churches erected by the Anglo-Norman settlers within the Pale. Neither can the Round Tower, though unquestionably a structure of much higher antiquity than the present church, be referred to the time of the Irish apostle, or perhaps to an earlier age than the ninth or tenth century. ”

“ It has a moral—a moral to selfish and ill-judging parents, and equally ill-judging societies, who lay the flattering unction to their souls that coercion will have a better effect than a fair and consistent example. ”

“ The household of a widower in the middle and humbler ranks of life is rarely ordered with regularity and decorum, and Peter’s was no exception to the general case. Every room had an aspect of untidiness and discomfort. ”

“ The elaborated sap is formed out of the ascending sap. The place where this change takes place is in the leaves and green parts of vegetables; it is generally in the spring season that the ascending sap pushes out the buds into branches, and developes the little scales which had surrounded these organs into leaves; but when these leaves are formed, the sap continues to ascend into them, and there undergoes those alterations from whence the elaborated sap results. ”

“ My master had an aged father, who lived in the house with him, and whom the neighbours conceived to have laid by a considerable sum of money. I usually slept across the hearth in the kitchen, and was one night awakened by a cry for help in the half-choking, gurgling accents of a man under the effects of strangulation. ”

“ The latter at the same time approached me and said, “Tell you what, young ’un, they’re talking of a fight ’twixt you and me; and if so be they’re in earnest, take care of yourself—that’s all.” “But, dear Boxer,” inquired I, wagging my tail in a conciliatory manner, “why should we fight?—surely we have no cause of quarrel?” “No business of mine,” answered he; “pleases my master; likes to see us bite and tear each other; great fun to him; must please him; gr-r-r.” So indeed it was, and I, though scarcely more than a puppy, was pitted against the redoubted Boxer. I was very unwilling to fight ”