Page:Once a Week Volume V.djvu/414

 . 5, 1861.] 

“Yes,” I replied. “I believe the fact to be so, for such an announcement has appeared in all the newspapers. But why do you ask the question?”

“Why do I ask the question?” responded the farmer. “Why? Because I am deeply and personally interested in it.”

“Indeed! then, perhaps, you are a relation of the Marshal’s?”

“Me! a relation of the Marshal’s? There isn’t one drop of his blood in my veins.”

“Then how come you to be deeply and personally interested in the elevation to a Spanish dignity of a person who must be a complete stranger to you?”

“It is easy answering that question,” said the farmer. “The reason I take an interest in the matter is, that simple and humble as I may appear, yet it was from my house the first of the O’Donnells ever left Ireland to go to Spain; and it was by the merest accident I did not inherit an immense fortune by their doing so.”

“That is a strange story you are telling,” I ventured to remark.

“Strange! it is the most wonderful story ever you heard, and as the sun is shining brightly, and there is an old trunk of a tree for you to sit upon if you are tired, and if you have half-an-hour to spare, and will listen to me, I will tell you the whole narration from the beginning to the end—and a better spot for telling it than this there could not be, as I can point out to you the several places I have to mention in my history.”

“Go on with your story,” I observed, “you will find me a patient and attentive listener.”

The old man lighted his pipe, and, seating himself by my side, he pointed to the hills, a couple of miles distant from the high-road, and directly opposite to where we were seated, and thus expressed himself:

“You know that the dark, dull, gloomy-looking mountain to the right, and which is all over rocks and furze-bushes, is called ‘Tory Hill,’ and you know that the hill that is facing us, and is tilled, is called ‘Rahar’ (but its right name is ‘Rath-ar’),