angels can be invoked. They are looking at
the hammers and triggers of pistols; they are
loading guns; they are fixing and sharpening
bayonets with hideous smiles of cruel meaning.
They are cursing the boys of Drumbride and
Ennisheen for being late, and cheering the
gossoons of King's Court and Ballynavorneen for
being early, though they had to come through
the bogs on foot.

It is not difficult to sketch the place of the
Ribbonmen's meeting—a plain whitewashed
little chapel, with a strip of green before the
door, and inside the railings a large iron cross,
with the emblems of the Passion attached to it
by a crown of thorns. The interior of the
dimly lit, building is plain and poor, a timber
roof, whitened walls, with here and there a
staring coloured picture of the Virgin or St.
Patrick, or a list of services or pilgrimages, a few
rough chairs and benches, at the east end a deal
platform, upon which the priest paces up and
down while he delivers his sermon. On this
platform stands the altar with the receptacle for the
host—a plated sort of watch-case surrounded by
metal rays. There are a few horn-books and dog's-
eared primers, and there is a cane lying in the
window; for Stonetown being a poor place, the
school is held in the chapel, and all day the
parish clerk and schoolmaster, Pat Devan, has
been beating into the barefooted, quick, ragged
peasant children scraps of dog Latin, dreary
sections of the multiplication-table, and
fragments of Irish grammar. Those black sods
lying in a heap by the low smouldering fire of
red-hot peat are the fees that each boy brings
daily to pay for his rough schooling. The
chapel is hot, reeking, and close, for it has not
been opened since the classes left.

Mr. Devan is held by the country people,
the peat-cutters and ploughmen of Stonetown
and Reagstown, to be a prodigy of learning. The
only wonder is, that he never went to carry off
all the prizes at Maynooth, or to astonish the
learned Jesuits at St. Omer. He can read the
breviary in Latin, and can repeat the prayers for the
dead almost as well as Father Murphy. He knows
the Hours by heart, and can recite long poems
in Irish. He can hardly ask you how you are,
or how the wife and childer are, without bringing
in the Latin. No one prostrates himself lower
or with more solemnity when the bell rings and
the host is elevated; no one in Louth has gone
more pilgrimages, or performed more stations.
No one can tell you more about the Holy
Father, and the great ceremonies at Rome; and
whisht! he is one of us; he is in all the secret
societies. It is in this chapel the Ribbonmen
meet and discuss their plans of attacking houses
for arms, to be ready for the next rising. He
denounces traitors and spies. He knows when
Meath is ready, when Monaghan is up, when
Cavan is troubled, when Louth has got
something on its mind. As he is the clerk of the parish
as well as schoolmaster, he keeps the key of
the chapel, so that no one but those who ought
to know it, need know of the meetings of the
Whiteboys or the United Irishmen. The halo
of the priesthood surrounds him also; he is at
once respected and feared. The village priest, a
worthy, portly, easy man, may or may not wink
at these political meetings. At all events, he is
not here to-night, but is no doubt by his own
cozy fire, warming his toes and reading one of
the Fathers near a table on which pleasantly
steams a reasonable quiet glass of whisky-punch;
or he is thinking of his pleasant college days,as he
watches the last bit of peat burn clear and blue
in the frugal little grate.

It is indeed a violent troubled night for a
rendezvous; one of those nights when the fir-
trees writhe and struggle with the wind, the oaks
rock angrily, and the elms lash the air in a
restless despair. The wind is tearing off the dead
leaves by sheaves at a time. Dead leaves dry
and crackle down every lane. Clouds of yellow
leaves break out of sudden corners, and fill the
air for a moment, before they scatter in utter
discomfiture over the loose stone walls and the
lonely miles of mountain, moor, and bog. The
wind has demoniacal outbursts of anger that
relapse into shrewish cries at keyholes, fretful
rattlings at shutters and doors, hollow moans
and shuddering vibrations down chimneys. If
ever the devils wander in the darkness prompting
hopeless men to despair, urging bad men to
murder and to cruelty, and rejoicing at the growth
and progress of wickedness wherever planning
or accomplishing, this is the night that should
bring them on such ghastly journeys, such is the
storm that should shroud and cover them
in their exulting search, leaving behind, a
wake of wreck, death, and destruction.

Devan goes round to the men in the chapel,
the fresh-coloured striplings and the old scarred
wicked-looking rascals who fought in 'Ninety-
eight, and gives them the sign and countersign
of the night. There is not much said above
a whisper, but the gestures, at which they
laugh hideously, seem to typify gibbets with
men hanging, and prayers offered up for such
men. Then, Devan takes a peat from the fire,
blows sparks from the lighted end, and waves
it over his head. There is a suppressed
shout and a wave of guns and pitchforks, as
some one produces a bottle of whisky and an
egg-shell; the fiery liquor is passed round,
till the eyes of the conspirators begin to glitter,
and a cruel alacrity inspires the tired men,
whom Devan now selects and divides into
two bands. Then, carrying the lighted turf,
Devan leads them into the road in rough military
order, and carefully locks the chapel door behind
him. They march from that chapel by the Mill
of Louth almost silently. Are they merely going
to drill, or are they going to attack some
farmer's house? Many do not yet know; all that
many know is that they have been called from the
forge and the plough, the fishing-boat and the
shibbeen, on some secret errand of the Ribbonmen
committee, and that they dared not refuse
to come. But Devan, and M'Cabe, Marron,
and M'Elarney, they know, for they are the
leaders, and every one will soon know. Through
the ranks from time to time spread the words,