The Collegians | Page 7

She made her appearance, however, while he was
himself making the necessary arrangements. They exchanged a greeting
somewhat colder on the one side, and more embarrassed on the other,
than was usual at the morning meetings of the father and daughter. But
when she told him, that she had been only to the chapel, the old man
was perfectly satisfied, for he knew that Eily would as readily think of
telling a falsehood to the priest, as she would to her father. And when
Mihil O'Connor heard that people were at the chapel, he generally
concluded (poor old man!) that it was only to pray they went there.
In the meantime Myles Murphy renewed his proposals to Eily, and
succeeded in gaining over the father to his interests. The latter was
annoyed at his daughter's obstinate rejection of a fine fellow like Myles,
with a very comfortable property, and pressed her either to give consent
to the match or a good reason for her refusal. But this request, though
reasonable, was not complied with: and the rope-maker, though not so
hot as Capulet, was as much displeased at the contumacy of his
daughter. Eily, on her part, was so much afflicted at the anger of her
only parent, that it is probable her grief would have made away with

her if she had not prevented that catastrophe by making away with
herself.
On the fair day of Garryowen, after sustaining a long and distressing
altercation with her father and her mountain suitor, Eily O'Connor
threw her blue cloak over her shoulders and walked into the air. She did
not return to dinner, and her father felt angry at what he thought a token
of resentful feeling. Night came, and she did not make her appearance.
The poor old man in an agony of terror reproached himself for his
vehemence, and spent the whole night in recalling with a feeling of
remorse every intemperate word which he had used in the violence of
dispute. In the morning, more like a ghost than a living being, he went
from the house of one acquaintance to another to enquire after his child.
No one however had seen her, except Foxy Dunat, the haircutter, and
he had only caught a glimpse of her as she passed his door on the
previous evening. It was evident that she was not to return. Her father
was distracted. Her young admirers feared that she had got privately
married, and run away with some shabby fellow. Her female friends
insinuated that the case might be still worse, and some pious old people
shook their heads when the report reached them, and said they knew
what was likely to come of it, when Eily O'Connor left off attending
her daily mass in the morning, and went to the dance at Garryowen.
* Little Mary Tierney.
* * *
3
How Mr. Daly The Middleman Sat Down to Breakfast
THE DALYS (a very respectable family in middle life) occupied, at the
time of which we write, a handsome cottage on the Shannon side, a few
miles from the suburban district above-mentioned.
They had assembled, on the morning of Eily's disappearance, a healthy
and blooming household of all sizes, in the principal sitting room for a
purpose no less important than that of dispatching breakfast. It was a

favourable moment for any one who might be desirous of sketching a
family picture. The windows of the room, which were thrown up for
the purpose of admitting the fresh morning air, opened upon a trim and
sloping meadow that looked sunny and cheerful with the bright green
aftergrass of the season. The broad and sheety river washed the very
margin of the little field, and bore upon its quiet bosom, (which was
only ruffled by the circling eddies that encountered the advancing tide,)
a variety of craft, such as might be supposed to indicate the approach to
a large commercial city. Majestic vessels, floating idly on the basined
flood, with sails half furled, in keeping with the languid beauty of the
scene; lighters burthened to the water's edge with bricks or sand; large
rafts of timber, borne onward towards the neighbouring quays under the
guidance of a shipman's boat-hook; pleasure-boats, with gaudy pennons
hanging at peak and topmast; or turf boats with their unpicturesque and
ungraceful lading, moving sluggishly furward, while their black sails
seemed gasping for a breath to fill them; such were the incidents that
gave a gentle animation to the prospect immediately before the eyes of
the cottage-dwellers. On the farther side of the river arose the Cratloe
hills, shadowed in various places by a broken cloud, and rendered
beautiful by the chequered appearance of the ripening tillage, and the
variety of hues that were observable along their wooded sides. At