LADY MORGAN. 387 " This is a heart y welcome to ye to Westmeath, Miss Owenson ; and this is to your health, mind, and body ! " Music followed, and she delighted her hearers with " Barbara Allen," and her favorite Irish song, " Ned of the Hills." The applause with which these selections were received was interrupted by the entrance of the but- ler, who announced that a piper had come from Castle- town, " to play in Miss Owenson." At once the young ladies proposed a dance in the hall; partners were chosen ; the music struck up ; the servants crowded about the open doors to look on ; and Sydney Owenson, always one of the lightest and most graceful of dancers, concluded her first day as a governess with an exultant Irish jig. Imagine such a d6but as this in a staid English or American family ! In spite, however, of her startling entrance upon the scene, she fulfilled the duties of her position conscien- tiously and successfully, and devoted most of her leisure time to the completion of one of the two half-finished novels. The work was finally concluded in Dublin, where the Featherstones spent a portion of each year, and she determined to see it safely in the hands of the printer before returning to Bracklin Castle. The novel had been accomplished alone and unaided, and she resolved to keep her secret to the last, though she did not even know the difference between a publisher and a book- seller. She rose early one morning, glided quietly down the stairs, appropriated to her own use the cloak and market- bonnet of the cook, which she found hanging in the hall, and slipped out of the house unperceived, carrying her manuscript neatly tied with a rose-colored ribbon under her arm. She had not the least idea where to go, and wandered about the business streets of the city, frightened and uncertain, until her eye fell upon a sign bearing the
