OConors of Castle Conor, County Mayo | Page 7

and, like some other sportsmen, intended to
make up for my deficiency in performance by the excellence of my
shooting apparel. "Those nails are not large enough," I had said; "nor
nearly large enough." But when the boots came home they struck even
me as being too heavy, too metalsome. "He, he, he," laughed the boot
boy as he turned them up for me to look at. It may therefore be
imagined of what nature were the articles which were thus set out for
the evening's dancing.
And then the way in which they were placed! When I saw this the
conviction flew across my mind like a flash of lightning that the
preparation had been made under other eyes than those of the servant.
The heavy big boots were placed so prettily before the chair, and the
strings of each were made to dangle down at the sides, as though just
ready for tying! They seemed to say, the boots did, "Now, make haste.
We at any rate are ready--you cannot say that you were kept waiting for
us." No mere servant's hand had ever enabled a pair of boots to laugh at
one so completely.
But what was I to do? I rushed at the small portmanteau, thinking that
my pumps also might be there. The woman surely could not have been
such a fool as to send me those tons of iron for my evening wear! But,
alas, alas! no pumps were there. There was nothing else in the way of
covering for my feet; not even a pair of slippers.
And now what was I to do? The absolute magnitude of my misfortune
only loomed upon me by degrees. The twenty minutes allowed by that
stern old paterfamilias were already gone and I had done nothing
towards dressing. And indeed it was impossible that I should do
anything that would be of avail. I could not go down to dinner in my
stocking feet, nor could I put on my black dress trousers, over a pair of

mud-painted top-boots. As for those iron-soled horrors--; and then I
gave one of them a kick with the side of my bare foot which sent it half
way under the bed.
But what was I to do? I began washing myself and brushing my hair
with this horrid weight upon my mind. My first plan was to go to bed,
and send down word that I had been taken suddenly ill in the stomach;
then to rise early in the morning and get away unobserved. But by such
a course of action I should lose all chance of any further acquaintance
with those pretty girls! That they were already aware of the extent of
my predicament, and were now enjoying it--of that I was quite sure.
What if I boldly put on the shooting-boots, and clattered down to
dinner in them? What if I took the bull by the horns, and made, myself,
the most of the joke? This might be very well for the dinner, but it
would be a bad joke for me when the hour for dancing came. And, alas!
I felt that I lacked the courage. It is not every man that can walk down
to dinner, in a strange house full of ladies, wearing such boots as those
I have described.
Should I not attempt to borrow a pair? This, all the world will say,
should have been my first idea. But I have not yet mentioned that I am
myself a large-boned man, and that my feet are especially well
developed. I had never for a moment entertained a hope that I should
find any one in that house whose boot I could wear. But at last I rang
the bell. I would send for Jack, and if everything failed, I would
communicate my grief to him.
I had to ring twice before anybody came. The servants, I well knew,
were putting the dinner on the table. At last a man entered the room,
dressed in rather shabby black, whom I afterwards learned to be the
butler.
"What is your name, my friend?" said I, determined to make an ally of
the man.
"My name? Why Larry sure, yer honer. And the masther is out of his
sinses in a hurry, becase yer honer don't come down."
"Is he though? Well now, Larry; tell me this; which of all the
gentlemen in the house has got the largest foot?"
"Is it the largest foot, yer honer?" said Larry, altogether surprised by
my question.
"Yes; the largest foot," and then I proceeded to explain to him my

misfortune. He took up first my top-boot, and then the shooting-
boot--in looking at which he gazed with wonder at the nails;--and then
he glanced at my feet, measuring