district alternately overrun by con tending tribes of men, equally ferocious and almost equally uncivilized, whose sole object was to render what neither could enjoy, equally unserviceable to the other, should have fallen into a state of nearly primitive wilderness and in this condition almost all the south of Antrim was at the period alluded to. The castles of the early conquerors had been razed to the ground or garrisoned by native chieftains; their mills broken down or converted into petty fortalices; their ploughed lands and meadows were overrun with thickets er matted into incipient bogs, while the flocks and herds of their successors, being mainly pastured in the interior, procured such a scanty supply as was needed on their occasional sojourn in the debateable grounds, from a few spots of grazing-land kept clear in almost inaccessible situations among the woods and mountains. Few men who could obtain a subsistence elsewhere, would embrace a life so precarious. Those who permanently dwelt in Northern Dalaradia, were accordingly either the outcasts of the clans of the interior, or such natives as had been forced out of the confines of Dufferin and the Ards, to make way for the influx of dispossessed settlers. Rude as these men originally were, their descendants, after the lapse of three generations spent among such scenes, were vastly worse in all respects, but in noue so much so as in point of religious instruction. When there was neither provision nor security for the clergy, it could not be expected that the church would flourish, for no dread of heresy had yet given to ecclesiastics that zeal which might have urged them to forsake their quiet abodes within the pale or in the undisturbed interior, for this desolate arena of strife and bloodshed between. While the face of the country, therefore, ran to waste, the morals of the people underwent a like deterioration; the scanty knowledge of Christianity bequeathed by the grandfather, lapsed into an idle superstition in the son, and half-forgotten tradition with the grand-children. Marriage became a civil contract or a mere concubinage, and christening was abandoned, at first for want of ministers, and then from ignorance of its use. Some had heard of a Creator, but few

of a Redeemer, and none could really. be said to have lived in the love or fear of either.

"It was while this state of things: was at the worst, that a monk of the order of Friars Minors, mounted on a mule, was making his way from the abbey of Muckamore, then the only religious house frequented on that side of Loch Neagh, across the mountains to his own priory of Carrickfergus. The lonely brother's path lay along. the slope of the hill sides, for all the lower ground was covered with thicket and morass, so that none but a footman trained to such a country, could make. good his way through their intricate wildernesses. As he gradually rose into a fuller view of the beautiful valley beneath him, the Franciscau could not but stop and gaze with melancholy pleasure on so fair a scene. "Alas!" he said, unconsciously speaking aloud, “see how this lovely land is run to ruin! There, where the clear river lingers among its holmes, once stood the preceptory of the knights of St. John; and there, within view of its windows, our Lady's chapels of Dunedragh and Nalteen; here was Moylusk, and there was Kilbride, and the bells of Connor used to be ringing sweetly from behind yonder blue hills before me. Wo is me! what are they now but green-gabled ruins, with neither bells nor clergy, but dens of wolves, and outlaws worse than wolves, for they have neither the humanity of men nor the sincerity of the brute animals? Ay, well might the holy. Bernard call the people of the same diocese this day, as he did three hundred years ago-protervos ad mores, ferales ad ritus, cervicosos ad disciplinam, spurcos ad vitam; Christianos nomine, re Paganos. Non decimas, non primitias reddentes' God forgive me, I have forgotten the blessed saint's words; but the matter is the same then and now. No; neither tithe nor first-ruits, neither ducs nor oblations to God's servants here; no blessed bands of wedlock, no cleansing waters of baptism, no comfortable aid of the confessional among many a family of the sons of Christians! It is a fearful thing to think of, and I cannot but shudder to remember how near our own doors the blame and the shame may lie, on that day when we are all summoned to give

an account of our ministry. But, God help us! it would be but a venturing into the lion's jaws to approach such men with words of peace or charity. There is the fierce outlaw, the unchristened Corby Mac Gillmore; he regards the house of God no more than the castle or the bawn of a settler. Forty churches he has plundered, forty communities of holy monks and nuns he has dispersed or put to cruel deaths. May God look down with mercy on this wasted land! for if Providence do not shortly stay the progress of its desolation, the blessed Patrick might as well never have set foot upon its shores." With a heavy sigh he turned his face again towards the mountains, but had not proceeded more than a few paces when he was startled to hear a voice at a little distance calling for help. The Franciscan crossed himself and looked around; there was no one in sight; a bare expanse of moorland sloped away towards the wooded vale on one hand; on the other, the ground rose abruptly in green knots, from amongst which a stream issued and crossed the path at his feet. It was up the winding channel of this rivulet that the call for help had sounded. "God knows what scenes of violence are acting behind these peaceful looking banks," thought the Franciscan; "I am afraid to trust myself off the beaten track; it may be a plan laid to decoy me, or if any other has fallen into ill hands, I may but share his misfortunes." But the cry came to his ears again, more piercing and imploring. The good brother hesitated. If violence were intended him, he was as much exposed where he rode as in the most secluded glen of the mountains; if his aid could be of any avail to a fellow creature in distress, he would be unworthy of his calling to refuse to lend it. "I come, my friend-I come," he cried, turning his mule up the little avenue, with a conscious flutter of self-approbation at his heart, although his hand could not but shake from a much less magnanimous emotion as it drew the reins, for brother Virgil, as Fergall Mac Naughten was called in ecclesiastical parlance, was considered a somewhat timid, although zealously pious and benevolent man. The first turn of the stream brought him in sight of the object of his search. It was a

man, alone, seated on the ground, with his head bent down as if listening to the sound of the mule's hoofs on the turf. The Franciscan, relieved from his apprehensions of foul play, urged his mule up the rough ravine as fast as the broken ground would permit, and in a few minutes was at the stranger's side. He bad not risen on the monk's approach, farther than to sit erect on the overhanging bank, while with quick and impatient gestures he signed to him to come on. He was a man of large stature, and singularly wild aspect and costume, evidently a native of the debateable district. To the monk's inquiry, in what respect his services were needed, he made no reply, but grasping the reins of the mule, whose back, as she stood in the hollow channel, was now almost on a level with his knees, he drew a long brazen skene from his girdle, and the terrified monk next instant beheld the weapon flashing in the sun as his treacherous summoner poised it aloft for his destruction; but the mule, startled at the suddenness of the act, swerved aside, and rearing at the same time, drew her detainer from his balance where he sat. The blow fell ineffectual on air, and the baffled assailant, pulled from his seat, tumbled headlong into the dry bed of the little river. The Franciscan's first impulse was to fly; but, ere he turned his mule on the narrow ravine, he cast a terrified glance at his enemy, whom he expected to see arisen and prepared to pursue; but the man lay motionless among the scattered fragments of rock that had received him, and yet the height from which he had fallen was so trifling that he could scarcely be supposed to have been stunned by that mischance. Brother Virgil had now got his mule's head turned, and ventured a second look his enemy still lay flat where he had fallen. The monk began to recover his courage: "Man of blood," he exclaimed, what demon hath possessed thee to lay violent hands on one who never harmed thee or thine ?" The prostrate man, raising his head, glanced at him and gnashed his teeth, but made no reply. "Thou art justly punished," continued the Franciscan ; "if thou hadst not raised thy hand. against a servant of the Most High, thy bones had never been broken, as they seem to be, by such a fall as this. The

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I am justly rebuked-very justly rebuked," cried the good brother, dismounting, and approaching the wounded man with a pardonable touch of pride in his somewhat ostentatious confidence. In his name I put my trust, and for the love of him I will aid thee, though thy hand hath been wantonly raised against my life but now, and I might with little blame leave thee to suffer the just punishment of thine own wickedness." As he spoke he raised the stranger in his arms, and, with considerable difficulty, succeeded in placing him upon the bank. He was dreadfully shattered one leg was broken below the knee, and the bone of the other seemed dislocated at the hip joint. Heaven help us!-these are sore bruises," said the Franciscan: "how came you to be so miserably maimed ?" "My horse fell upon me," replied the stranger; he lies a little higher up in the bed of the stream. I was riding into my own country before daybreak, and missed the way, so that I rode right over the bank where it is full two pikes' length in height. Garran Buy will never cross the hills with me again; he was killed stone dead; and for my own part, I never thought to rise neither, for I lay under him, unable to extricate myself, till I heard the wolves coming; then I got strength to drag my broken limbs from under the carcase, and crawled hither. I heard them growling over him all day; but since I began to cry for succour, they have been silent.”

"Holy and blessed Francis!" exclaimed the monk, "tis a perilous wilderness for peaceful men to journey through! And thou hast lain here since sunrise helpless and without food! "Twas God's great mercy alone that kept the ravening wild dogs from devouring thee!"

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"I slew a bitch wolf and her cub with my skene among yonder bushes in the hollow," replied the stranger: they had pursued me so far, as I dragged my broken limbs towards the path along which you came when you heard my cries; but I was unable to crawl farther than where you found me; the place, besides, was convenient for defence, as there were stones of a good size scattered about, with which I drove away another dog about mid

But, tell me truly," said the Franciscan, "wherefore didst thou raise thy hand against me?"

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The stranger hesitated. “I thought: you an enemy," at length he said. An enemy !" cried the Franciscan; "how could one in my garb be the enemy of any man?"

"I tell you, I mistook you for another," replied the stranger. "My enemy might have assumed the garb of your people to deceive me."

"Thou art evading me," said the: monk: "thou hadst some other reason. for assailing me."

"I had," said the stranger; "but I do not think fit to divulge it. You are safe now. Be satisfied of this-that I. mistook you. Nay, if you would hear more, know thus far-I meant to have slain him whom I took you for, and to have ridden hence upon the empty saddle."

"And how couldst thou, with thy broken limbs, have gained the back of any beast of burthen?" demanded the Franciscan.

"From where I sat I could have slid into the vacant seat with little difficulty," was the reply; "and my friends here of the woods would soon have removed all trace of the means by which I had prepared it for my reception." As he spoke, he pointed to the high grounds above, up which a leau wolf was slowly retiring from the remains of the fresh carrion in the ravine. The gaunt beast turned twice or thrice, and looked towards them, showing his white fangs, then clapped his tail to his hams, and crossed the ridge of the hill at a sullen trot.

"It was, indeed, a merciful interposing of God's providence that saved. me from his jaws!" exclaimed the monk. But, now that I have trusted

Thou hast fasted since before sunrise demanded the monk.

"Since before midday yesterday," was the reply.

The Franciscan, without another word, opened his scrip, and spread its contents on the grass. Ah," he cried, "as he took forth the materials of an abundant meal, "good brother Paul hath surely foreseen some such adventure on the road when he so liberally ransacked his larder. Come, my friend, let us forget our strife, and fall to. A draught from this flask of Muscadel will serve to revive thy spirits, if they be low, as a man's may well be after a four-and-twenty hours' fast. This is the ham of a badger-a dainty, let me tell you, fit for a lord abbot; here we have fine wheaten bread, and a pair of cold mallard: so, Deo gratias, eat and be thankful."

The stranger gazed at him with a mingled expression of gratitude and astonishment. "I am better pleased to have missed that blow than though I had the use of these broken bones again!" he exclaimed. This wine is worth an earl's ransom to me. I was wellnigh spent with pain and hunger;" and he addressed himself to the fare before him with eager appetite.

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"Friend," said the monk, "tell me thy name, that I may drink to thy recovery."

"My people call me Hugh More M'Adam," replied the stranger. "And your people-drinking to your speedy recovery, son of Adam-where dwell they?"

"Claneboy is my country," replied Hugh More, "and sometimes Kilultagh and Kilwarlin."

"Be not offended, son of Adam, if I tell thee that the people of thy country bear no good reputation for Christian worship on either side the pale," said brother Virgil, anxious to learn how far the report of their savage condition was correct.

"The nations of the pale are in marvellous ill report among us for vio

lence and hypocrisy," replied Hugh More.

"But it is credibly affirmed," persisted brother Virgil, "that many on the borders of Claneboy and Kilultagh use neither the rite of baptism nor the service of the mass. Nay, I have heard it said further that the honourable estate of Christian wedlock hath fallen into general disuse amongst them."

"And if it be," replied Hugh More, "who are to bear the blame? Are they these outlawed kindreds of men whom ye hunt like wolves with slot hounds from your borders, or the recreant priests who have deserted them in their need, that more deserve to be held in ill report?"

Nay," said the Franciscan, "we could not be so reproached were it not that it is held to be more than a Christian priest's life were worth to venture amongst them."

And how could it be otherwise?" retorted Mac Adam: "the last of your people that I saw amongst us was the fat abbot of Bangor: he rode in a jock and scull, like any man-at-arms, with the Red Savage of Ards and White from Dufferin. They preyed the country, length and breadth wise, from Bealfersad to Lough Neagh, and they spared none. He used I know not what incantations, to inflame his soldiery; but no day passed that women and children were not hunted down by the brutal churls, for the glory of their God, as they declared. That was the cause of the inroad, and he it was who planned and procured it. There, again, was the last prior of Carrick

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Nay, but," interrupted brother Virgil, finding his charges coming too near his own door, "these were not righteous or Christian priests, but violent and proud men, whose ministry is rather a blot and a disgrace to the church. What I allege in our defence is, that the meek and pious servant of Jesus dare not venture amongst you; else this reproach would soon be removed from your land, and the souls of your people would no longer go to perdition as they do."

"If any man," said Hugh More, "be desirous of coming amongst us for the sake of instructing our kindreds in religion and civility, I will be his surety that he comes by no harm