Evening star., 1896-10-24

He'd Serve Her.
keeping class, whose little flock was an in
heritance handed down, dwindling through
many generations; and whose main inter-
ests and activities had time out of mind
turned upon wool, so that everything con-
nected with 1t had acquired in their eyes
the peculiar sanctity with which we often
Invest the materials and implements be-
longing to our own craft. A chimney sweep
has probably some feeling Of disinterested
regard for his bags and brushes. Accord
ingly sheep were to them a serious. almost
solemn subject, altogether unsuitable for
a practical joke, and an insult offered to
them was felt to strike at the honor OF the
family. Small blame to them, therefore, If.
as the reighbors said. they were ragin'
mad entirely and turned a deaf ear to all
pacific overtures.
The O'Farrells, to do them justice, ad-
mitted upon reflection that they had maybe
gone little beyond the beyonds. and were
disposed to be apoogetic and conciliatory.
But when old Mrs. O'FarreI. one day meet
ing the two smallest McNeills on the road,
presented each of them with a pale brown
egg, which she had just found in the nest
of her speckled hen away down beside the
river, the result merely was that her gifts
were smashed into an fmpromptu omelet
before the McNeills' door. by the direction
of the master of the house, who only wish
ed the Ould sinner had been there herself
to see the way he'd serve that. or anythin
else she'd have the impotence to be sendin
into his place. And later on, when the
feathery gold of the O'Farrells' oatfield had
been bound in stocks, and the hObbledehOy
Pat was dispatched to inquire whether the
McNeills might be wantin' e'er trifie of
straw after the thrashin' for darnfn' their
bit of thatch, the polite attention ELECTED
nothing except peremptory injunction to
quit out of that
In taking up this attitude the McNeills
had at first the support of their neighbors
sympathy, public opinion being that it was
no thing for the O'Farrells to go do. But
time went on, people began to add occa-
sionally that sure maybe they didn't mean
any such great harm after all. and that
they were only young boyoes, without as
much sense among the whole of them as
would keep a duck wading straight. What
was the use of being too stiff over trife?
These magnanimous sentiments were, no
doubt, strengthened by the fact that in SO
small a community as Meenaclure per-
manent breach between any two families
could not but entail some inconvenience
upon all the rest. 1t was irksome for in
stance to bear In mind throughout
friendly chat that at the casual mention OF
a neighbor's name the person you were
talking to would look "as bitter sut
and freeze into grim dumbness: or to have
to consider. should you wish for loan of
Wildly O'Farrelrs market basket. that you
must by no means "let on" to her your in
tention Of carrying home in 1t Mrs. Nc
Neilrs grain of tea; or to be called upon to
Neill and Hugh O'Farrell on the way home
from the fair, because neither of them. as
the saying Is. would look the same side Of
the road the other. Such obligations lay
stumbling blocks in our daily path, and nip
growths of good fellowship, and are gener-.
ally embarrassing and vexatious. How
ever, Meenaclure had to put up with this
state Of things for so many a long day that
people learned to include 1t unprotestingly
among their necessary evils.
PART Ill
Under these circumstances it was of
course. only in the nature Of things that the
little McNeills and O'FarrelIs, the smallest
of whom had rot been born at the time of
the quarrel, should always put out their
tongues at one another whenever they met.
They regarded the situation, indeed as a
sort of ceremonial observance, which could
not be omitted without a sense of inde-
corum Thus, one inclement autumn, when
Patrick O'Farrell was no longer a hobble-
dehoy. but "as big man as you'd meet
goin' most reads" he went of to "rab-
ble," that is. hiring fair. at Letterkenny,
and took service for six months with a
farmer at Raphoe. On the day that he left
Meenaclure he happened, just as he was
setting out. to meet Molly McNeill, who
had by this time grown into "a tall slip of
girl going on for SIXTEEN" and they duly