"I have told you, holy father," she said, "that I am the unfortunate sister of the great Mac Seneschal. My father lived in a strong castle over Ďundonald; you can see the hill from the door. May the Queen of Heaven pity me! Look which way I will, I behold nothing but the scenes of my shame or of my misery; for if I look up, there is the cave where Mac Gillmore kept my brother Raymond till his beard was grown over the collar of his hauberk; and if I look down, there are the fair hills of Ards and Castle reagh, where I once roamed through the green woods and meadows, innocent and happy, as I once was, and as I am never to be again!" The lady paused, and wiped away a tear; then, with a heavy sigh, proceeded-"We were two brothers and myself, and we spent a happy childhood; but my mother died while we were all young, and my father was slain in an ambush by the wild Irish, while my brothers were still youths, and I a girl just rising into womanhood. Raymond and Alan were unlike in character as in their looks. Raymond was open and fiery, but kind and tender-hearted; Alan, black as his own brow, proud, revengeful and turbulent. They had both been wild hunters and rangers of the woods before my father's death; but when the kindred rose to avenge his murder, they took to the wars as if they had been bred to nothing but blood and plunder. Fierce and terrible warriors they grew, above all others of their age in Ulster. Many a creaght they plundered, many a strong castle they broke and burned, while their cheeks were yet beardless as my own. All the Irish of Kilwarlin and Claneboy stood in terror of them; for they scarce spent one day in twenty within their own walls, but were almost constantly in the field, burning and preying. The kindred had been bold and warlike in my father's time; but under Raymond and Alan they became quite as fierce and cruel as the barbarous clans they had to contend with. It used to shock my soul to hear the tales of slaughter and devastation which they would bring home with them from their ravages. I would urge mercy on Raymond, and sometimes for my sake he was merciful; but with Alan I never yet prevailed to save a grey hair

from the sword, or a widow's cow from the driving. I was glad when they left me alone, even while I shuddered to think of the work they went on. I could then forget the tumults and distresses of a life of violence in the quiet lawns and woods about our own castle; for there we were far removed from danger, and friends were at hand if danger had come nigh us. I was young, father; and worn as I am today with hardship and suffering, I was then not unworthy to be called the daughter of Margery Ghal Ni' Niel; my heart was new and eager, and I longed, as I roamed the green meadows, for some one better able to share its fresh affections than the maidens with whom I spent the idle mornings, wishing and wondering as we would sing the songs of true lovers, or listen to the strange tales of ladies and their knights. Well, father, one evening before sunset, as I sat alone in a haunt that I loved dearly

it was a mossy grotto in the bank of a little stream that ran hard by the bawn of the castle-I saw a strange hunter coming down the glen with his dogs. He carried a bow and a hunting-spear, and had a sheaf of arrows stuck in his belt, and his dogs were the goodliest I ever saw. But, father, he was himself, I thought, by far the goodliest man I ever saw, and by my troth I think so still; for, broken as he lies within, Mac Gillmore is still the best man of his name, and they are the tallest kindred of men in Ulster at this day. It was there I saw him first, father; but we did not speak that evening. He came back again the next night and spoke to me, and I staid talking with him till after sunset. I had no thought of harm in what I did; but I told no one when I came home, only hurried to my bed and thought myself almost happy at last. He came back again, evening after evening, and as often as he came I was there to meet him. He told me he was of the clan Rory—and true it was, for his mother's people were of the blood of Kilwarlin-and that he had not been with his kindred since the month before, but was on a hunting expedition, with ten comrades only, in the woods. I asked no more; for whatever he told me I was satisfied with it. A happy life I had, until we parted for that time; for he told

me one evening that he must follow the roe-deer into Dufferin, but promised to come back in four days. I came home that evening with a sadder heart than I can tell you. But I was doomed to have cause for worse trouble than the grief of a foolish girl longing after her lover's return. The kindred had been abroad for twenty days, and they came back that very night. They had been defeated in a great battle with the wild Irish, and had lost all their prisoners and a great prey of cattle at the fords. Raymond was wounded, and two of our fosterers killed, and Alan was wild with rage and grief. They were our old enemies, the clan Gillmore, that had set upon them; and, father, think what a story it was for me to hear, when they told me that Hugh Oge, the Gillmore's youngest son, who had headed his people in the battle, had been twice seen hunting within a mile of our castle only three days before! Alan had heard it from a ranger of the abbot of Bangor, who had met him in his beat. He described him as he had seen him in the fighttall, dark, some three or four years his own elder, wearing a belt set with studs of silver, and swift of foot as a red deer. Who had seen him?-It was at the head of the glen the ranger said he met him. Who had been in the glen of late? Had I seen any stranger there or in the wood?-He questioned me so fiercely that for a moment I thought he must have known all. But I denied it; I could not have confessed it after what I heard, though it had been known to all the clan; for I was now sure that my lover was no other than the young Mac Gillmore and, father, I did not tell you at the time; but you will, I think, feel some compassion for me when I tell you now, that this kindred, this Muintir Gillmore-I will tell you presently, when this choking in the throat leaves me:-they were the same wild Irish of whom I told you; they were the same clan who slew the Seneschal. But, father, do not think that Hugh had any part in his death. No; bad as I am, you need not shudder at the suspicion that I am wedded to my father's murderer! Oh, no! Hugh was then in Dufferin, preying the Whites under their own walls of

Killileagh; but it was Adam Garv Mac Gillmore, the old chief, his father, who laid the ambush. The Seneschal had hanged two of the kindred, who were found hunting within his bounds, and Adam was sworn by sun and wind to revenge them. Three times they came down with the whole strength of the clan, and thrice we beat them off: but, after the oath he had sworn, Adam Garv would not rest till he had fulfilled it. So, hearing by a spy that the Seneschal was gone to Carrickfergus to meet his cousin, the prior of Muckamore, he laid an ambush of ten men in the wood beyond the fords of Lagan, and after lying in wait two nights and a day, accomplished his purpose. My father and his cousin were both slain by arrows as they rode at the head of their company; and so swift of foot were the Gillmores, that the mounted men at arms who guarded the seneschal, were unable to come up with them on the broken ground; so that Adam and his fosterers escaped. I had heard strange and dreadful reports of the Muintir Gillmore, as was natural among a family that had experienced such a loss at their hands. The two poor wretches whom my father had first put to death, were said to have been no better than pagans, having died without once calling on either God or the saints; and it was now affirmed that the whole clan were utter heathens. I had never thought of the clan Gillmore without a shudder; I had fancied them a race of such beings as I had heard of under the name of wild men of the woods; and, in truth, with regard to the kindred at large, my fancy did not much deceive me; but when I became certain that Hugh was of the clan, a wonderful change came over my mind. Sore, sore I strove against it; long I strove to cherish horror where my breast would admit love only; for horror of Hugh Oge my heart could not conceive. When I would try to paint him bloody, fierce, exulting over my dead kinsman, as I thought that duty should have shown him to my eyes, I could see nothing but the picture of the beautiful, swift, eagle-eyed young hunter: his eyes haunted me in the dark; his voice was sounding sweetly in my ears, though Alan should be raging against our father's murderers at my side. Night and day I strug

gled, though from the first I felt that love would triumph in the end; and at length love did triumph, and I found myself on the evening of the fourth day watching for the swift footsteps of him whom I dare scarcely trust myself to think of on the first. The kindred were again gone; Raymond was recovered, and had taken the field along with his brother. I was once more alone, and I could resist no longer; so I had stolen out to the head of the glen; trembling at the prospect of seeing my hopes fulfilled, yet satisfied that all my former horror had been prejudice, and that all my present weakness was the work of charity. He came. Oh, father, I cannot describe that meeting! He was wounded and bleeding, his dress torn and disordered; for he had travelled since mid-day through the wildest woods in Ulster. He had been wounded, he said, at first in a dispute with the hunters of Kinalearty. Alas! he little thought what I knew when he said so. I was glad, father, that he was wounded, though Heaven knows how willingly I would have borne the pain for him; but I was glad to have the respite even of dressing my lover's wound before I would have to tell him that I knew him. I had done; but I could not say the word: Mac Gillmore saw my distress; he cast himself at my feet, he told me he had deceived me, that he too had come to confess, but that his heart at first had failed him also. I, too, confessed all; I know not what I said, but I did not reproach him. He was full of joy and gratitude; he told me that his kindred were gone from the pastures they had occupied, and out of reach of our arms; that they were satisfied with the recovery of their herds, and would prosecute the feud no farther, if allowed to remain in their new territory undisturbed. He told me, too, that he had spared Raymond's life, for my sake, at the fords; for that he had passed him when he was down in the fray, and bestowed the death-blow that might have rid his kindred of their cruellest enemy, upon another. He said he must join his clan at their place of muster before daybreak, but that he would have a token left for me when I should expect his return. And then he asked me would I go to the woods with him, and be a hunter's bride, if

he could find a territory of his own where we could live apart from his kindred, who were at feud with my people? I could not have said 'yes' that evening, for all the wealth of Ireland; I could only weep and pray for happier times: but I promised to meet him again; and when we parted, I felt more alone in the world than ever. I had refused to listen to his entreaties that I would go to the woods with him; but when left alone, I did little else than imagine pictures of the sylvan home he had promised me. You may be sure, father, that the woods were always green, and the glades for ever sunny in my dreams. There was no image there of leafless branches howling in the sleet, as I have heard them since, the length of many a dismal night; no thorny brakes, dripping with chill dews, were there; no picture of desert marshes, weltering in the noisome vapours of summer, or of sedgy river banks cutting the bare feet with their sharp blades in December. I had little thought of the life I was to lead then; and yet, father, hard as my lot has been, I have had such happiness as love could give; and if I could but see those I love brought to a knowledge of holiness and peace, I would be happier than many a lady who never walked the dew. Oh! on the bare earth let me lie while I live, if I could but see that blessed day!"

"Thou wilt see it yet, please God, my daughter," said the good Franciscan: "but go on, I pray thee, with this strange story of thine."

"From what I have told you," said the lady, "you will easily divine the rest. Hugh's token came to me in little more than a week after; and I met him in the wood where we had appointed. He told me he had left the kindred for my sake; that he had found vacant pastures in Claneboy, and built a hunting booth in a delightful valley for our home; that none but his two foster brothers and their wives would be with us, and that all the wood-rangers in Ulster might search for ever without finding our retreat. Horses were at hand, mantles and disguises prepared; and the priest, he told me, was waiting in the woods. He wrapped me in a mantle, and I was on horseback before him ere I well knew what I had done. I would

fain have had more time; but Hugh said that my brothers were already on their march homeward, and that if Alan were once returned I need never hope to be allowed the chance of seeing him again. It was vain to lament; and in all my shame, when I thought of my unmaidenlike conduct, and amid all my real grief at leaving my home and kindred behind me, I confess, father, that I was better satisfied in my heart than I would have been had Hugh yielded to my entreaties, and left me as I prayed he would. We rode through the woods till after midnight: what path we took I knew not, but after we had travelled a long way, we saw a light before us among the trees. Here there was a party of wilder-looking men than I had ever seen before, about a great fire. They seemed to have had as long a journey as ourselves, for their horses, where they stood tied to the trees around, were covered with foam and reeking in the strong fire-light. I thought he must be a friendly priest who had ridden so hard at that dead hour of night to such a spot, on such a service. But I was still more amazed to see that it was not a mere priest that was awaiting us. I knew him by his robes to be a diguitary of the church; and, holy father, judge of my consternation when on approaching nearer, I beheld the Lord Abbot of Bangor, bareheaded, his dress torn, and his whole person exhibiting signs of violence, and evidently a prisoner. In reply to my exclamations of horror and amazement Hugh told me we could not get a priest's services otherwise; for that his people were under the displeasure of the church, in consequence of the murder of the prior of Muckamore, and had to get such rites administered as best they might, and that had latterly been by strong hand only. It was then, for the first time, that I felt the bitterness of real remorse. Oh, what I would have given to have been back with my brothers! But it was too late now. Hugh lifted me to the ground. There were women there who supported me. The Abbot was dragged forward: Owen Gumach on one side, and a fosterer of Mac Gillmore, who was since slain, on the other; both

with drawn weapons and savage threatening aspects. The Abbot was so hoarse, from crying for assistance, that he could scarcely speak. He was so indignant at his illtreatment, too, that violent denunciations interrupted every sentence. Mac Gillmore's people crowded round with looks of mirthful savage curiosity, as if they had never seen a churchman before, or thought his office ridiculous. The abbot's threats were met with rude laughter, and, if he refused to proceed with the directed service, blows forced him to go on. In vain I wept and supplicated. In vain I would have said 'no,' while my heart, full of grief and abhorrence as it was, said 'yes.' The words were wrung from the reluctant churchman, and an oath was forced from him at the dagger's point, that it was a true and binding marriage he had celebrated. Blessed be God, he did not know me! and I know not what name they gave him for me. Had he known me then, I would have died rather than borne his reproaches; but he knew who I was afterwards, as you shall hear, father. I can talk of that scene now with little emotion, for I have bebeld others since that leave it few horrors; but I was then long insensible after it was completed, and when I returned to consciousness again, the abbot and his fierce escort were gone, and I was alone with my bridegroom. Father, it is wonderful the power Mac Gillmore has had over me from the first moment he saw me to this day. My anger could never last before his caresses, and before his anger, thank God! I never had to stand. The abbot had told me I was going among unchristened pagans, and that the man I was marrying was a heathen, who had neither God nor saint to pray to. I believed it all to be the natural invective of the insulted churchman; not that Hugh ever told me he was a Christian, for I had never dreamt that it would be necessary to ask him the question, but that the violence he had doue the abbot was so great as to make it natural for that enraged ecclesiastic to deny that he or his people could be such. In truth, father, after the shock was over, I was too happy in my new home, which we reached next night, to inquire whether the abbot spoke truly or not.

:

It was in the pleasantest season of the year, and we wanted for nothing that hearts contented in themselves could wish for. We were in the fastest country in Ireland: there was but one pass to it, and a single man could hold it against a hundred. Hugh spent his mornings in the field, hunting and fishing at night he played on the harp, or sang to me, while his fosterbrothers made their arrows, or prepared their fishing tackle. The wives of our fosterers were modest and kindhearted, and as we were many a day's journey from a church I never asked to attend one. In truth, father, I forgot every thing in the novelty of my situation. I no longer remembered which was Sunday or which Monday; for all days of the year were high festivals with us; and if Hugh brought us game from the woods for twenty days together, I excused his supposed forgetfulness by remembering that it could not but be long since one leading such a life as his, could have received instructions from his clergy. It was sinful, I know, thus to forget my duties in my happiness; but, father, it was thoughtlessness more than conscious neglect. Winter came, and our hunting booth was strengthened and enlarged; a bawn was raised about it, and the kindred sent us a herd of fat cattle, with warm mantles and whatever else the season demanded. Winter passed as happily as summer, and my baby was born in the spring. But Hugh had been summoned away three days before. He had promised not to remain longer than a single day, yet he did not return for ten days after. Fears for him made me less anxious to have my boy baptized than I would have been had he been with me. In truth, I scarce thought of the infant's christening in apprehensions for his father's safety. At length he returned; but what a tale he had to tell me! The retreat of his people had been discovered, and my brothers, with the church vassals of Bangor, Muckamore and Carrickfergus, had spoiled them of their entire substance, burned their dwellings, and put more than one half of their whole number to the sword. Adam Mac Gillmore and his eldest son were amongst the slain, and on Hugh the chieftainship of the kindred VOL. VI.

had devolved. The remnant of the clan were to be with us that night, Hugh had scarce time to kiss his infant son before he was again summoned away to muster the little force of fighting men that remained, and make one last effort to recover some of their plundered herds. Weak as I was, I rose and assisted in preparing the best reception we could for the fugitives. I had never seen any of my husband's kindred, save those who lived along with us, and the wild horsemen who had been present at my wedding. I now no longer regarded them with abhorrence as the murderers of my father, I was eager to alleviate their sufferings as the victims of my people's revenge; so that I awaited their arrival anxiously; but, father, when the multitude of mourners, children, women, and old men, who were henceforth to be my kindred, appeared toiling slowly up the hill before our dwelling, I was in the first bitterness of my disappointment, base enough to reproach Hugh in my heart, for bringing me among such savage beings. But their wild aspects soon ceased to be the only cause of my shame, and, I confess, of my renewed abhorrence, for, after they had pitched their booths, and secured the few goods they had been able to preserve, some of the elder women came to my dwelling, to offer me such services as they had in their power to bestow. My infant was naturally the chief object of their attention; and they showed such tenderness about him as won my gratitude. It was kind and generous in those, who but a few minutes before had been bewailing their own dead, to sing as they did to the child of one, whose people had been such bitter enemies to them. But while they were nursing the infant, and trying to trace a likeness to his father on his little features, one of them asked me by what name I meant to call my son; and I will never forget the terror and sickness that fell upon me, when, on my replying that so soon as our present troubles were over I hoped to get a priest, and have him called for his father; she who had asked the question, looking as if she did not understand me, repeated the words-"A priest, bantierna, and what would you please to do with a priest ?"

To baptize any child," I answered. 2 Q