PAT AND THE BEES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XXXXIII, Issue 14, 18 January 1901, Page 4

PAT AND THE BEES.

In Charles Lever's delightful/" O'Donor:huc" there occurs a reir.arkably rich passage the relations subsisting between an improving English landlord and an tenant The scene is ory the lawn of the j CT'onoghue's r.assfe in Kerry. The tenant? have assembled to-meet the worthy Engl<sb bTcnet who ha;j purchased the property, and who with.- his agent standing in the parlour-window, watches eagerly for some resist of the many "improvements" which at great a6st ho has endeavoured to introduce to.vx wild and untutored peasants of the district. The agent presents the tenants to the worthy innovator who enquires Into th' condition of the grumbling and dissatisfy d recipients of his favours. At length, on a tenant presenting himself, v.-him the agent failed to recognise, the tiar.-i'.et turns to the figure before him, which, vith face and head swollen out of al! proportion, and showing distorted features ap.d fiery eyes through the folds of a cotton handkerchief, awaits his address in "lien silence. ' Who are you my good man ? What has happened to you ?" " t-aix, an' k's well y« may ax; me own mother wouldn't know me this blessed morning! 'Tis all your own doin' entoirely." " ;-!y doing 1" replies the astonished 1 r ::vt. " What can I have to do with the siiti: you arc In my good man ?" " Yes, it is your doin'," answers the enraned proprietor of the swollen head; - Tis all your doin'. and well ye may be proud of it. 'Twas thim blessed bees ye i,ev me. We brought the divels into the house last night, an' where did we put them fb>;t in the pig's corner. Well, after Katty, an' the childer, an' meself was a while in oca, the oig goes rootin' about the house, Lr.'.l he wasn't aisy till he hooked his nose into the hive, and spilt the bees out about the Sure; and thin whin I got out of bid to i?t out the pig that was a-roarlng through the house, the bees slttled down on me, an' 1' stingin' me an' I jumped into bid P tain wid the -whole of thim after me and Kstty and the childer; and thin, what wid bees a-buzan' an' a-stingin' us under the clothes out we all jumped agin' an' such a was never spent in Ireland as we spint last night. What wid Katty and the childer a-roarin' an' a-ballin' an' the pig t\-in' up and down like mad, an' Katty wid the besom, an' myself wid the fryin'-pan *:.itttMin' the bees agin the wall till morning', the sight we wor in the mornin'— i ;'..r it's ashamed oi yerself ye ought to i C"