logical knowledge was not sufficient for the ordinary duties of the pulpit, and recommended further study to the postulant. Not long afterwards, Barry was ordained, and appointed to the living. A friend who knew him intimately, asked how he had contrived to get over his examination? "Oh, very well indeed," replied the Reverend Mr. Barry. "The bishop was very good-natured, and did not puzzle me with many questions." "But what did he ask you?" inquired the other. Why, he asked me who was the great Mediator between God and man, and I made a rough guess, and said it was the Archbishop of Canterbury."

It is satisfactory to think, that at the present day it would not be easy to find such a specimen as this of episcopal "good nature."

Talking of modern works of fiction, he highly praised Bulwer's "Night and Morning." "I like that book," said he; "I read it with very great interest. I think it is the only one of Bulwer's novels in which a w does not figure as one of the leading characters. That is a decided improvement. But he has made a great legal blunder. He requires his reader to suppose that Philip Beaufort has no mode of establishing his own legitimacy except by producing the certificate, or the registry, of his parents' marriage. Here is a great mistake. Philip's

mother would have been a sufficient witness in her son's behalf. Philip need only have levied distress on the estate for his rents; and if his right to do so had been contested, his mother's evidence of his legitimacy would have been received in any court of law as conclusive in establishing his right. It is a great mistake. This comes of men writing of matters they know nothing about. Sir Walter Scott was a lawyer, and always avoided such errors."

CHAPTER XXIX.

Carlow Agitation-Methodist Confessions-St. Mullins-The Contract for Coffins-Father Sheehy-The Carlow Election-Pathetic Appeal from an exasperated Agitator.

IN June, 1841, O'Connell, Steele, John O'Connell, and Mr. Thomas Reynolds, went down to the County Carlow to canvass the electors for the Liberator's youngest son and Mr. Yates. They remained several weeks. I joined the canvassing party for four or five days, and then returned to Dublin to assist in the management of the Repeal Association.

During my short stay in the County Carlow, our party proceeded to agitate the barony of St. Mullins, a remote and secluded corner of the county, into which the canvassers had not previously penetrated.

This barony is situated about twenty miles from the town of Carlow, and the road passes through scenes of wood, and hill, and valley, as beautiful as

any in the central parts of Ireland. The domain of the Kavanaghs, at Borris, seems intended by nature as the fastness of an Irish chieftain, with its ancient woods of oak, the wild, steep hills in its vicinity, and the noble castellated gateway leading into the park-no paltry, imitative Gothic, but designed and admirable taste.

in pure

The carriage was occupied by O'Connell, his son John, Father Maher, of Carlow, and myself. In the morning there had been a profession at the convent, and crowds had attended to see the novice take the veil. The mention of this circumstance led O'Connell to talk of Catholicity, and the devotion of the Irish to their faith.

"Ireland," said he, "is fulfilling her destinythat of Catholicising other nations. Wherever a few exiled Irish get together, the first thing they think of is, to procure the ministration of a priest for their little community. Thus a nucleus of Catholicism is formed, and the surrounding inhabitants are attracted; first, by curiosity; then they are led to inquire; and, finally, several will end by embracing the faith. It is these little colonies of Irish who have largely helped to diffuse Catholicity through England."

Mr. Maher spoke of O'Connell's letters to the Methodists. "A Tory gentleman told me," said

he, "that the first of those letters drove the iron three inches deep into Methodism; but the second drove it in beyond the possibility of being extracted."

Mr. Maher gave some interesting details of a meeting of Methodists at which he had been present in Liverpool. He was on a visit with some English friends, not Methodists, whose curiosity induced them to obtain admission to the Methodistic orgies by the following expedient: Persons unpossessed of tickets were denied ingress, as the meeting was to be strictly select, and confined to "classed," or "banded" members. One of the Englishmen got up a mock quarrel with the doorkeepers, and whilst the attention of the latter was thus engaged the rest of the party walked in without hindrance. A preacher exhorted all who were present to confess their sins openly. Several persons, upon this exhortation, successively got up, declaring they were moved to lay open their guiltiness; but it somehow happened that in the course of their "confessions" not one of them revealed a single fault. On the contrary, they all made boastful declarations that God had kept them wholly free from sin since their last public confession. According to their own account, a more stainless, spotless set of Christians were not in existence !