the prayers when we go back — we'll say our own then," &c. Now the more experienced father or mother would not have said this to a stranger, and such might have passed for a true convert, while receiving the "stirabout." The priests were very quiet while this kind of bantering was in progress; they knew its beginning, and by this "concordance" could well trace the end; they held these favored ones of their flock by a cord while the stomach was filling, as the traveler does his steed that he is watering, and turns it away when its thirst is assuaged, caring little at what fountain he drinks, if the water be wholesome. "We had as lief they would be in that school as any," said a priest, "while they are so young; we can counteract all the bad or wrong impressions their lessons may have had on their minds."
The priests of Ireland have had their wits well sharpened by the constant check held over them by penal laws, and a government church, and they have not been guilty of great proselyting, finding as much work as would keep them upon the alert, continually to keep their own hold, and the flock safe already in possession. The Episcopalians and Dissenters, on the other hand, knowing that they were the minority, and, that the power they held was not precisely "just and equal," feared that some new king or minister, or some sudden government squall, might blow down their uncertain bamboo fabric, had to double their cries of priestcraft and popery, persecutions and murders, to keep their citadels of self-defense well secured, with
