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That the proud Bodagh, and his prouder wife, would never suffer their beautiful daughter, the heiress of all their wealth, to marry the son of Fardorougha, the miser, was an axiom, the truth of which pressed upon his heart with a deadly weight.
Some said he had got a free pardon, others that he was to be liberated after six months' imprisonment; and a third report asserted that the lord lieutenant sent him down a hundred pounds to fit him out for marriage with Una; and it further added that his excellency wrote a letter with his own hand, to Bodagh Buie, desiring him to give his daughter to Connor on receipt of it, or if not, that the Knight of the Black Rod would come down, strip him of his property, and bestow it upon Connor and his daughter.
* This word is used in Ireland sometimes in a good and sometimes in a bad sense. For instance, the peasantry will often say in allusion to some individual who may happen to be talked of, "Hut! he's a dirty bodagh;" but again, you may hear them use it in a sense directly the reverse of this; for instance, "He's a very dacent man, and looks the bodagh entirely."
"Well, but Fardorougha acushla, now hear me, throth it's thruth and sinse what you say; but still, avourneen, listen; now set in case that the Bodagh and his wife don't consint to their marriage, or to do anything for them, won't you take them a farm and stock it bravely? Think of poor Connor, the darlin' fine fellow that he is.
There was something so utterly innocent and artless in this reply, that each of the three persons present felt sensibly affected by its extreme and childlike simplicity. "Don't be afraid of me, Una," continued the Bodagh, "but answer me truly, like a good girl, and I swear upon my reputation, that I won't be angry. Do you love the son of this Fardorougha?"
"Good morrow mornin' to you!" "Arrah what Age may you be, neighbor?" Now the correct words were, "What Age are we in?" "In the end of the Fifth," was the reply. "An' if you wor shakin' hands wid a friend, how would you do it? Flanagan, who apprehended pursuit, was too cautious to trust himself within reach of any one coming from the direction in which the Bodagh lived.
The circumstance which produced the first conversation they ever had arose from an incident of a very striking and singular character. About a week before the evening in question, one of Bodagh Buie's bee-skeps hived, and the young colony, though closely watched and pursued, directed their course to Fardorougha's house, and settled in the mouth of the chimney.
When he reflected on the danger to which his beloved Una was exposed from the dark plans of this detestable villain, and recollected that there existed in the members of the illegal confederacy such a strong spirit of enmity against Bodagh Buie, as would induce them to support Bartle in his designs upon his daughter, he pressed his hand against his forehead, and walked about in a tumult of distress and resentment, such as he had never yet felt in his bosom.
Be the contents o' the book, if I thought he'd thry it, I stick to him like a Throjan; the dirty Bodagh, that, as Larry Lawdher said tonight, never backed or supported us, or gev a single rap to help us, if a penny 'ud save us from the gallis.
You know yourself that, as soon as I heard anything of the ill-will against the Bodagh, I tould it to you, in ordher mark that in ordher that you might let him know it the best way you thought proper; an' for that you've knocked me down!" "Why, I believe you may be right, Bartle there's truth in that but I can't forgive you the look you gave me."
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