T. & J. COLDWELL,] No. 23.

[50, CAPEL-STREET VOL. 1.

PORTUMNA.

Tars town is situated at the head of Lough Derg, 74 miles from Dublin, in the parish of Lickmolashy, barony of Longford, and county of Galway. It contains about 145 houses, with a population of 736 persons, and in consequence of the improved navigation of the Shannon, by steam-boats, is now one of the greatest corn markets in that county.

949, The Danes, with a large fleet of boats, traversed the waters of Lough Derg, devastating and plundering all its holy islands, and exacting hostages from the surrounding country, until the people of Munster rose up against them and compelled their retreat.

988, Brian Borù traversed Lough Derg-passed up the Shannon here, and thence into Meath, which he devastated to a great extent.

1124, Turlogh O'Conor led a fleet of boats from below this place into Lough Derg, for the purpose of invading the ancient territory of Desmond, and in three years afterwards he mustered 190 vessels on this lake, in aid of a similar and no less successful expedition.

1160, Roderic O'Conor swept the Shannon above and below this town, as also the whole of Lough Derg, and exacted hostages from the O'Briens, and their Dalcassian warriors.

1226, Henry the Third, by letters patent, granted Portumna with other possessions, to Richard de Burgo, a nobleman whose progeny became allied to royalty in each of the sister kingdoms, and in Ireland, more especially, contributed an inheritance of patriots to her politics, and heroes to her history.-About this time probably that castle was erected whose ruins are still trace able near those of the above one.

1369, By inquisition of this date, Lionel, Duke of Clarence, was found seised of the manors of Portumna, Loughrea, &c., in right of his wife, Elizabeth, the daughter of William de Burgo, Earl of Ulster, to whom they had lineally descended, and from whom, having passed into the Mortimer family, they were subjected to all the vicissitudes of that nobleman's for

tunes.

The monks of the Cistercian Abbey of Dunbrody, (the annals of which I have given in the Fourth Number of this MAGAZINE,) had from a very early period a chapel here, which was dedicated to St. Peter and St. Paul, but being at length forsaken by them, O'Madden, the Irish dynast of the country, gave it to certain Dominican Friars, who, with the approbation of the monks of Dunbrody, erected a friary here, and also, a church, which they dedicated to the Blessed Virgin and the original patron saints. They, at the same time, built a steeple, cemetery, and all other requisite offices.

1426, Pope Martin, the Fifth, granted a bull to confirm the possessions of the said last-mentioned friary, with indulgences to all who had contributed to its erection. The walls of this edifice are, I am informed, still entire, and evince that it must have been no ignoble structure.

1610, The Earl of Clanrickard had a confirmation of his rights in the castle monastery-fair and markets of Portumna

1634, That talented despot, the Earl of Strafford, in the prosecution of his impolitic scheme for subverting all the titles to the Connaught estates, held the investigation as to those of the county Galway in the castle of Portumna. "Notwithstanding, however, his own presence on the bench," to use the words of Mr. Hardiman, "and the many specious arguments made use of by council to induce the jury to find the king's title, they unanimously found against it. Lord Strafford, enraged at this decision, immediately put the Sheriff, Martin Darcy (of

he Kiltolla branch,) and the jury under arrest; had them brought close prisoners to Dublin, and there tried, before himself, in the castle chamber."

"We bethought ourselves," says the Lord Deputy, referring to this circumstance, in one of his state letters, "of a course to vindicate his majesty's honour and justice, not only against the persons of the jurors, but also against the sheriff, for returning so insufficient, indeed, we conceived so packed a jury, and, therefore, we fined the sheriff in £1000 to his majesty, the jurors in £4000 each, and to be imprisoned until the fines should be paid, and until they should acknowledge their offence in court, upon their knees." "The jurors," adds Mr. Hardiman, "petitioned to be discharged, but their prayer was refused, except on condition of their making a public acknowledgment that they committed not only an error in judgment, but even actual perjury in their verdict-terms which they disdainfully rejected. The sheriff died in prison, in consequence of severe treatment, and the jury were most cruelly restricted, until after suffering the utmost rigours of the confinement, their fines were reduced, and themselves released at the solicitation of the Earl of Clanrickard.

"The Lord Deputy still determined to carry his point, again caused two further commissions to issue, the one to find the king's title to the county, and the other to the county of the town of Galway. The commissioners met at St. Francis's Abbey, in April, 1637, when the juries, terrified at the example made of their predecessors, were respectively induced to find for the crown, and on the returns thereof, the county was planted at a double rate, and the natives lost half their lands, whereas the other less refractory counties lost but one fourth. Thus terminated through the influence of power this illegal proceeding, for which with other arbitrary measures resorted to in England, and during his government here, the ill-fated Strafford afterwards lost his head, but its injurious effects, without benefitting the crown, were lasting and considerable. Irritated, beyond measure, at so glaring an act of injustice, openly committed against them, after so many royal assurances in their favour, the gentlemen of the county loudly proclaimed their discontent and fixed resolution to embrace any opportunity which might offer to be revenged, and of the sincerity of their determination the fatal events which soon after took place, afforded melancholy proof."

1636, The Earl of Clanrickard died, as it is supposed, in consequence of the vexation conceived by him at the encroachment so made upon his property, and attempted to be legalised with the sanction of a court, held in his own house. He was succeeded in his honours by the justly celebrated Ulick, the fifth Earl of that line.

1641, At the breaking out of the troubles in this year, this nobleman was at his CASTLE of PORTUMNA, whereupon, and on hearing of them, he took all practicable precautions for the socurity of the county and town of Galway. His character is thus finely and justly drawn by Carte. "He was a man of great piety and strict virtue, regular in his devotion, exemplary in his life, and considerate in all his actions. His natural parts were very good, and much improved by study, observation and reflection; but whatever were the accomplishments of his head, the perfections of his heart were still more eminent. In a word, he was truly wise, truly good, and truly honourable, and ought to be conveyed down to posterity as one of the most perfect and rarest patterns of integrity, loyalty, constancy, virtue, and honour, that the age he lived in, or any other has produced." By his rank and influence, for the most considerable gentlemen of the county were his tenants, he had considerable effect in resisting the insurrectionary movements of this period; he maintained his castle of Portumna, and protected and sustained all who resorted thither, with an hospitality that incredibly encoached upon his income.

1650, The said Marquis, having been on the departure of the Marquis of Ormond appointed Lord Deputy of Ireland, resided principally at Portumna.

1659, General Ludlow, the regicide, besieged the castle of Portumna.

1663, Richard, Earl of Clanrickard, obtained a grant, or rather confirmation, (inter alia) of the manor and CASTLE of PORTUMNA, with large tracts of the surrounding country, also the monastery of Portumna, and certain of its possessions, subject to a prescribed yearly rent, and a certain market or fair to be held in said town, with court of pie poudre, and free market on every Tuesday. This magnificent title-deed purports to confirm, or convey to the Clanrickard family upwards of 530 expressly defined quarters of land, eighty castles, fourteen ma

nors, twenty of the richest abbies in Connaught, with other various possessions, in lands, tithes, &c., besides sundry advowsons and rights of presentation, dependant chapels, annual and chief rents, fairs, markets, mills, weirs, &c., &c. 1690, Colonel Gustavus Hamilton sent a party from Birr towards Portumna, who meeting with some of King James's forces, routed them, killing some and making others prisoners. 1691, Captain Palliser, of the Earl of Drogheda's regiment, went with a party from Carolante towards Portumna, where he surprised some of Lord Galmoy's horse, and took several prisoners, as also, good store of rich plunder, with arms, clothes, and several other things of value. Subsequently, Brigadier Eppinger was detatched from King William's army with a party of 1,200 horse and dragoons to Portumna, where an Irish garrison still held out for King James. On this occasion, however, it surrendered on the terms of being allowed to march out with arms and baggage, first towards William's camp, where they had liberty to lay down their arms if they pleased, or else to go on towards the Irish army.

1795, An act, reciting that the ferry, or passage over the river Shannon, at or near the town of Portumna, was attended with much delay and inconvenience to travellers, and that the building of a bridge there would greatly tend to promote agriculture, and be of public utility, provides for the appointment of trustees who were empowered to receive subscriptions, to the amount of £8,000, to purchase the rights of those concerned in the ferry, and erect a bridge, with liberty to exact certain pontage tolls, (half of which were to be remitted on fair days.) It was also provided by said act, that the bridge should contain a rising portcullis, with wooden piers, the arch to be opened for ships, &c.

1826, An accidental fire consumed the castle of Portumna, with all its furniture, books, &c., leaving it that desolate transparent shell which the above wood cut pourtrays it to be.

The Shannon, gliding magnificently by the town, rolls itself out, immediately below the castle, into that noblest of its expanses, Lough Derg, or more properly, Lough Dergheart, when, after the indulgence of eighteen miles of lake, it again contracts itself into a river, and flows by KILLALOE, as illus trated in the twenty-second Number of this MAGAZINE.

In the Leabhar Dinn Seanchus is a poem of 27 ranns, "on the origin of this Lough Derg." It is computed that about fifty islands are encircled within this splendid sheet of water, the largest of which is called Ilanmore, and comprises about one hundred fertile and well-cultivated acres. Another more remarkable is designated the Holy Island, and exhibits the remains of seven churches, and a lofty round tower.

I may be permitted here to add of the lordly river to whose banks I have, for the fourth time, conducted my readers, that it is the most considerable river, in regard to size, to be found in any European island, although confessedly inferior to the Thames in the grand requisites of navigable utility, and internal commerce. Its source is amongst the mountains near Swanlingbar, whence it falls into Lough Allen, a fine sheet of water, eight or nine miles in length, and four or five in breadth. Thence issuing, it flows through Lough Reagh, a lake of about fifteen miles in length, beautifully diversified with upwards of sixty islands, whence it proceeds onwards by ATHLONE, (See No. XII.) CLONMACNOISE, (See No. VII.) Shannon Bridge, Banagher, and PORTUMNA, through Lough Derg, thence by KILLALOE, (See No. XXII.) to Limerick, from which city it is navigable to the sea, being a distance of sixty-three miles. "Its whole length, therefore, is as follows:

From its source to Athlone 66 miles-from Athlone to Killaloe 52 miles--from Killaloe to Limerick 10 miles-from Limerick to the sea 63 miles.

In this course," continues Cromwell, in his Excursions through Ireland, (I do not mean Oliver, his excursions were not so calculated for the descriptive,) "in this course the Shannon falls over small cascades, in the following proportions:

Between its source and Athlone 39 feet 0 inches.
Between Athlone and Killaloe 14 .. 10
Between Killaloe and Limerick 97
2

Above Limerick, therefore, the Shannon is navigable only for
boats, and that only for a few miles, or upon the lakes therein
before alluded to.
J. D.

ANCIENT IRISH BIOGRAPHY.-No. XXIII.

HUGH VI.

THE death of the lamented Malachy, in 863, was succeeded by the accession of Hugh VI. to the monarchy. This prince

was son to Niall III., who held the throne immediately before Malachy. It would seem that the death of his predecessor again separated those bonds of common interests and patriotic duty which had begun to unite the native rulers of the country, and consequently encreased the strength of their enemies, the Danes. The latter contrived, with much cunning, to embroil them still more wherever they found it possible to interfere, and then took advantage of the quarrels they created to promote their own objects. At length they again risked open conflict in the field, with those on whom they had daringly eucroached, or with whom they had insidiously ingratiated themselves, and thus proclaimed their continued thirst for plunder and conquest, and the same daring spirit which had so often inflicted the worst evils on our countrymen. The first victim of their renewed rapacity was Connor, a prince who governed a portion of territory in the present county of Meath, who was attacked by them shortly after the accession of Hugh. Amlave, or as he was called by his countrymen, Humphrey, the Prince of Denmark, marched his forces against him, and slew him at Clonard, with a great number of the Irish, after which he proceeded with a large body of troops, on an expedition to Scotland, where he committed horrible atrocities, and obtained immense plunder. The consideration of these bold measures taught the Irish monarch the necessity of some prompt and vigorous effort to crush their designs in the commencement, and accordingly he collected an army and marched against that part of the Danish forces which had settled in Ulster. The foreigners met him, and a desperate conflict ensued, which, however, terminated as most fair battles did, in favour of the Irish. The battle was fought at Lough Foyle, and twelve hundred of the Danish troops were killed, besides forty of their chiefs, whose heads were carried in triumph from the field. The monarch resolutely followed up his victory by attacking the strongholds which they had seized on, or built, for the security of their plunder, and as places of. retreat; in these he found great wealth collected, with which he was enabled to indemnify his soldiers and subjects for their exertions and sufferings. Among the places on which the native forces wreaked their vengeance, in this manner, was the palace which Amlave had erected for himself, I believe at Clondalkin, in the neighbourhood of Dublin, which was set on fire and destroyed, with a body of the Danish troops stationed in it, among whom, it is said, were one hundred officers who perished in the confusion. The Danish general, however, was not a man to suffer such acts without resistance; he laid an ambuscade, by which he routed a body of two thousand Irish, and killed great numbers of them, after which he attacked the city of Armagh, and plundered it, and his forces devastated the adjoining country, after their frightful custom.

Notwithstanding these successful reprisals, it does not seem that the Danes considered their forces sufficiently strong to cope with the power of the Irish, and it is stated that many of them, at this time, betook themselves to their ships, and relinquished their hopes of immediate conquest in Ireland. In fact, we hear little more of them from this period-about the year 870-during the remainder of this monarch's reign. The neighbouring countries, however, were still exposed to their insatiable desire for plunder, while circumstances tend to prove that Ireland was regarded as a place of refuge by their victims. Roger, King of Wales, sought protection from them here about this time, and was received with that generous hospitality which has ever characterised our countrymen, and the fact that the relicks of St. Columb-kille were removed from the sacred repose of the celebrated abbey of Iona, founded by himself, for safety to Ireland, should satisfy us that for this interval at least the bravery, and, above all, the union of the Irish people had again made their country the home of the stranger. It is, however, probable that much of this tranquillity, in Ireland, may have been owing to the exertions required from the Danes to maintain their power in England, where the contest was now carried on between them and the native forces with great warmth. They had, just at this crisis, made an unsuccessful inroad on the kingdom or province of Mercia, being driven back from Nottingham to York, and though they succecded better in East Anglia, where they martyred King Edmund for refusing to agree to their demands, they were opposed with great energy and skill, in Wessex, by the Prince Ethelred, who was assisted by his brother, the illustrious Alfred. The death of Ethelred, in 871, by a mortal wound received in the battle of Basing, placed Alfred on the throne, and eventually led to the signal deliverance of his country from the foreign yoke. It is unnecessary for me to pursue the fortunes of this prince further than to trace the connexion of his struggles with the same barbarians that oppressed Ireland,

and the temporary cessation of their outrages on our countrymen. It was during the period when Alfred was compelled to take refuge in the wilds of Somersetshire, and carried on a predatory warfare, with the aid of a few followers, against Gothrun, the Danish chief, who had nearly surprised and taken him prisoner, at Chippenham, and whose troops now over-ran the entire of Hampshire, Dorset, Wilts, and Berkshire, in Wessex, that the Irish monarch peacefully departed this life. The date affixed to this event is Friday, the 20th of November, 879. His reign is not signalized by any remarkable event, but it was, on the whole, one of unusual happiness to his country, as being less marked by the ravages of the invaders, and the more fatal evils of domestic strife. The wife of this prince was Malmuire, daughter of Kinneth, the thirty-fourth king of Scotland, of Irish descent, and who is celebrated as a lawgiver, and as having encouraged a taste for science and literature among his subjects. She survived him and was married to his successor. C.

WHISKEY.

I REGRET that the following remonstrance of an Indian chieftain to his tribe, on the injurious effects of spirituous liquors, can be translated and addressed to too many of our countrymen, with a fidelity of reproach that does not suffer by tho change of venue.

"BRETHREN AND FRIENDS!-Since the introduction of what you call liquors, and what we think may be justly called poison, our happiness has been greatly diminished. It has destroyed the energies and resources of your red brethren.

"This liquor, which has been introduced into our country, is more to be feared than the gun and the tomahawk.

“Brothers, when our young men have been out hunting, and are returning home, loaded with skins and furs, on their way if it happens they come where some of this whiskey is deposited, the white man who sells it tells them to take a little drink.Some of them say-No; I do not want it.' They go on till they come to another house, where they find more of the same drink. It is there offered again-they refuse; and again the third time: but finally the fourth or fifth time one accepts it, and takes a drink, and getting one he wants another, and then a third and fourth, till his senses have left him. After his reason comes back again to him, when he gets up and finds where he is, he asks for his peltry, the answer is-"You have drank them.” "Where is my gun?" "It is gone." "Where is my blanket?" "It is gone." "Where is my shirt?" "You have sold it for

whiskey."

"Now, brothers, figure to yourselves what condition this man must be in. He has a family at home, a wife and children who stand in need of the profits of his hunting. What must be their wants when he himself is even without a shirt."

I cannot more forcibly evidence the congeniality which equally deludes my fellow-countrymen on this subject, than by citing the following verse from one of the native Bacchanalian Odes preserved by Mr. Hardiman, in which the bard," his eye in a wild frenzy rolling," is represented as addressing the essence of spirit-whiskey.

You're my soul and my treasure, without and within-
My sister and cousin, and all my kin.
"Tis unlucky to wed such a prodigal sin;

But all other enjoyment is vain, love!
My barley-ricks all turn-to you,
My tillage-my plough-and my horses too-
My cows and my sheep-they have bid me adieu.
I care not-while you remain, love!

Many's the 'quarrel and fight we've had,
And many a time you made me mad;
But while I've a heart it can never be sad,

When you smile at me full on the table.
Surely you are my wife and brother-
My only child-my father and mother-
My outside coat-I have no other-

Oh, I'll stand by you while I am able!
&c. &c. &c.

1 trust the editor of the "Irish Minstrelsy" will excuse my making this selection of the more maudlin" passages from one of these interesting Lyrics, but it does so faithfully pourtray the reckless destitution to which the love of whiskey reduces its votaries, that in justice to my subject, I have adopted its language.

Water was the beverage that God gave to man, and all other animals; milk was a luxurious regale, and those appear to have

to make his fortune elsewhere, and wherever he meets another Scotchiman he makes brotherhood with him, and takes his part through thick and thin; and so they proceed helping one another to the end of the chapter, and the consequence is, you can scarcely visit any portion of the globe in which you do not meet prosperous Scotchmen.

Let me not be mistaken in making these remarks. I do not make them unkindly, and I hope no one will receive or use them in such a spirit. The spirit is a noble one in both instances, it is only the abuse of it that becomes ridiculous or offensive. Love of country is as noble a passion as ever expanded the human heart. A great man, (and to the pride of Scotland be it spoken, a Scotchman) has asked

"Lives there a man with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said-

This is my own, my native land !"

And the wretch whose heart did not vibrate at the thought is unworthy of the being with which heaven has endowed him.

The love of our countrymen, and a desire for their advancement, is not so romantic a feeling, but a more kindred one, and to the individual more practically useful, and, as I have before premised, if not abused, one to be praised, rather than depreciated.

Now all this time that I am prosing about other people's pride, has not an Irishman a pride of his own too! To be sure he has. But I'm afraid it is not so useful a pride as either the Englishman's or the Scot's. An Irishman will exclaimwhere's the like o' the Emerald Isle?" and boast of the "Island of Saints ;" and remind you how Saint Patrick "dhruv every sarpint and toad and vinimous thing out o' the place," and proud of being descended from sone ancient line of kings, whose posterity have neither kingdom nor crown, nor half-crown, perhaps; and he will swear that an Irishman will fight "any man out, at all," and, indeed, to do Pat justice, it is only fair to say that he'll be as good as his word as often as any chose so try him; but he has not that English pride of country which rejoices in the soil that gave him birth taking her suitable position amongst the nations of the earth, at the present smoment, though Pat prides himself on her ancient glory; nor has he that universal feeling of the Scot to advance a countryman's interest me ely on the score of compatriotism. Would to God he had both! I hope to see the day when Irishmen shall have entered into such bonds of useful fellowship, and stand by each other for the prosperity of themselves and their native land. But where am I rambling to? I began with the intention of giving a comic instance of an overweening pride in one's own possessions being made the source of ridicule and loss to him who indulges in so weak and unainiable a propensity. Here I am at the end of a column moralizing. Doing the philosopher. Little claim, or none indeed, have I to such title. Whatever trifle of philosophy may be about me is certainly of the laughing order. But I so seldom trespass on philosophic ground that I hope for pardon; and now-to my story.

Mr. Bull was an Englishman who visited Ireland in the capacity of traveller to a London commercial establishment, and thinking he saw an opening for commencing trade on his own account in Dublin, he forthwith settled in this our Hibernian metropolis. But though he considered that Ireland suited his views better than England, he, notwithstanding, never dreamt of giving up one golden dream of British pre-eminence, and Irish inferiority. Imagination-no-not imagination :Englishmen are not much troubled with that Irish poetical and unprofitable commodity. It was not imagination but the genius of habit, had settled on his soul like a night-mare, which kept eternally humming to him that good old ditty of "Rule Brittania," which his father and grandfather before him had lived and died in the belief of, and which he, therefore, conceived to be the best belief in the world. To such a man many practises in Ireland, were unpleasing. Our potatoes which he in his œconomy of language clipped to the cockney standard of taties," were, for a long time a source of offence to him by being boiled with their jackets on, and it required some time to convince him that the English plan of peeling them, and soaking them in water before boiling, only made them spongy and unwholesome food.-Next in excellence, however, to all things in England, was every thing in his house in Ireland. I believe he even went so far as to say that his servant had the greatest brogue in Ireland, but he invariably protested vociferously that decidedly no man in Ireland had such good whiskey as his.How he continued to monopolise all the good whiskey in Ireand he never would explain, but swore stoutly to the fact.

He became a member of a club called "the queer fellows," and a very appropriate name it was; for some of the greatest wags in Dublin belonged to it, and no night passed at this club without some capital bit of whim being put in practise, and as for humour, it was the habitual language of the clubroom. To such a knot of persons did Mr. Bull attach himself. Ireland, he acknowledged was the land of wit, and he believed himself to be the wittiest person in it. The club received him as a member, merely to laugh at him, and many a roar of mirth, which his absurdity often occasioned, he flattered himself were but tributes to his cleverness. One night, at this meeting, he, as usual, began to brag of the excellence of every thing belonging to him, and, on one of the members remarking what excellent whiskey the landlord of the house had supplied them with, Mr. Bull protested it was not good whiskey at all.

"You certainly have a superior judgment in whiskey; I own to that," said one of the club, winking at the same time to the rest of the company, " and I often wonder how an Englishman could get his tongue round the real taste of it so well."

"An Englishman! sir," said Bull; "and why not an Englishman? Sir, I maintain that the taste of an Englishman in all things is equal if not superior to any other mans' on the face of the earth."

"In one thing I admit," replied the other, "you Englishmen have a great taste for eating-but as for drinking I won't give up to you. I can't, Bull. But considering you are a stranger you have a large share in that particular too, but, man alive, you don't set up, I hope, to know good whiskey better than the natives that were fed on it!"

"I do," replied Bull. "I will stake a wager on my superior judgment in whiskey; and I repeat that this whiskey you praise so much is not so superior-very fair though-fair whiskey-but, sir, no more to be compared to my whiskey !"-

"Well, now, Johnny, my boy," said an old hand at humbug, interrupting him, "I'll show you a way to decide the matter fairly and on the spot. Just send for a bottle of this wonderful whiskey, this aqua mirabilum of your's, and we'll impannel a jury of good men and true,' to try it."

"Well said," cried another of the members, "our facetious friend Bull, is only hoaxing us, I believe. He's a deep wag. He merely pretends to have this inimitable whiskey, or I'm sure he would have sent us a specimen of it, of his own accord, long ago."

"No;" said Bull, "it is no hoax. I am a wag, to be sure, I don't deny it; but 'pon my life it's no hoax. I have the whiskey, but as for sending you a bottle of it, I cawnt, because sir, as how, I never keeps any whiskey in bottle. I keeps it always in the cask."

"If it's so precious it is worthy of a casket instead of a cask." "No, no, sir, a cask is better. You'll excuse me; but a cask is the true thing to keep it in."

"So it appears, sure enough," said the senior of the club. "For 'pon my conscience it keeps your's very safe?"

There was a laugh at this rejoinder which Mr. Bull did not perceive the point of, but pursued his discourse, insisting on the efficacy of wood for the better keeping of whiskey, which only increased the laugh at his expense

“Oh, you may laugh if you like," says Mr. Bull, “but I assure you I'm right. It is not all whiskey that is worthy of so much care, but I pick my whiskey."

"Why you told us just now you had it on draught." "Well, and what then?"

"Why, I suppose you draw it off the cask as you want it ?” "Exactly so."

"Well then, you must take it as it comes." "Certainly."

"And how can it be picked whiskey if you take it as it comes?" Here was another laugh at poor Johnny's expense, who, though he fancied himself a wit, could not perceive any of the equivoke that was going forward against him, and he said, at last-"I'm sure I don't know what you're all laughing at.I say my whiskey is in the cask, and I have none in bottles or I would give you one with pleasure, if it was only to convince you that there isn't such whiskey in the world."

“Mr. Bull," said the senior, "I'll settle all that difficulty for you in the twinkling of a bed-post. You have the mistress at home, and if you write a note to her, desiring a bottle to be filled with the stuff, we'll send a messenger and a bottle into the bargain."

There was no getting over this proposition, and as Mr. Bull knew that he did not enjoy the reputation of being the readiest man in the world to part with those good things he was so fond