luncheon basket,--facts so mirth-provoking that Molly wipes tears of
pleasure from her eyes with the milky undershirt, and Oonah sets the
hot-water jug and the coffee-pot on the stairs to have her laugh out
comfortably. When once the car departs, comparative quiet reigns in
and about the house until the passing bicyclers appear for luncheon
or tea, when Oonah picks up the napkins that we have rolled into
wads and flung under the dining-table, and spreads them on tea-
trays, as appetising details for the weary traveller. There would
naturally be more time for housework if so large a portion of the
day were not spent in pleasant interchange of thought and speech. I
can well understand Mrs. Colquhoun's objections to the housing of
the Dublin poor in tenements,--even in those of a better kind than
the present horrible examples; for wherever they are huddled
together in any numbers they will devote most of their time to
conversation. To them talking is more attractive than eating; it
even adds a new joy to drinking; and if I may judge from the groups
I have seen gossiping over a turf fire till midnight, it is
preferable to sleeping. But do not suppose they will bubble over
with joke and repartee, with racy anecdote, to every casual
newcomer. The tourist who looks upon the Irishman as the merry-
andrew of the English-speaking world, and who expects every jarvey
he meets to be as whimsical as Mickey Free, will be disappointed. I
have strong suspicions that ragged, jovial Mickey Free himself,
delicious as he is, was created by Lever to satisfy the Anglo-Saxon
idea of the low-comedy Irishman. You will live in the Emerald Isle
for many a month, and not meet the clown or the villain so familiar
to you in modern Irish plays. Dramatists have made a stage Irishman
to suit themselves, and the public and the gallery are disappointed
if anything more reasonable is substituted for him. You will find,
too, that you do not easily gain Paddy's confidence. Misled by his