'
"'Why,' replied the living sister, 'you're only six days dead.'
"'Ah, avourneen!' said the other, 'it can't be--it can't be! for I have
been thousands on thousands of years in pain!'--and as she spoke this
she disappeared.
"Now there's a proof of the pains of purgatory, where one day seems as
long as a thousand years; and you know we oughtn't to grudge a thrifle
to a fellow-crature, that we may avoid it. So you see, my friends,
there's nothing like good works. You know not when or where this lad's
prayers may benefit you. If he gets ordained, the first mass he says
will be for his benefactors; and in every one he celebrates after that,
they must also be remembered: the words are _pro omnibus benefactoribus
meis, per omnia secula secularum!_
"Thirdly--hem--I now lave the thing to yourselves.
"But wasn't I match for Pettier Donovan, that would brake a stone for
the marrow *--Eh?--(a broad laugh at Pother's rueful visage.)--Pettier,
you Turk, will your heart never soften--will you never have dacency, an'
you the only man of your family that's so? Sure they say you're going to
be marrid some of these days. Well, if you get your wife in my parish, I
tell you, Pettier, I'll give you a fleecin', for don't think I'll marry
you as chape as I would a poor honest man. I'll make you shell out the
yallowboys, and 'tis that will go to your heart, you nager you; and then
I'll eat you out of house and home at the Stations. May the Lord grant
us, in the mane time, a dacent appetite, a blessing which I wish you
all,------&c.
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