"
"But do you know what I was tould about Father Philip, Bartley?"
"I'll tell you that afther I hear it, Mary, my woman; you won't expect
me to tell what I don't know?--ha, ha, ha!"
"Behave, Bartley, an' quit your jokin' now, at all evints; keep it till
we're talkin' of somethin' else, an' don't let us be committin' sin,
maybe, while we're spakin' of what we're spakin' about; but they say
it's as thrue as the sun to the dial:--the Lent afore last itself it
was,--he never tasted mate or dhrink durin' the whole seven weeks! Oh,
you needn't stare! it's well known by thim that has as much sinse
as you--no, not so much as you'd carry on the point o' this
knittin'-needle. Well, sure the housekeeper an' the two sarvants
wondhered--faix, they couldn't do less--an' took it into their heads
to watch him closely; an' what do you think--blessed be all the saints
above!--what do you think they seen?"
"The Goodness above knows; for me--I don't."
"Why, thin, whin he was asleep they seen a small silk thread in his
mouth, that came down through the ceilin' from heaven, an' he suckin'
it, just as a child would his mother's breast whin the crathur 'ud
be asleep: so that was the way he was supported by the angels! An' I
remimber myself, though he's a dark, spare, yallow man at all times, yet
he never looked half so fat an' rosy as he did the same Lent!"
"Glory be to Heaven! Well, well--it is sthrange the power they have! As
for him, I'd as fee meet St.
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