A WAKE.

Tim Scanlan, while he lived, was only a labouring man; but he was well liked in the country; and it was expected that his funeral would be an unusually large gathering. Crowds flocked to the wake, and a great provision of tea, whisky, pipes, and tobacco had been made. The widow occupied her post of honour at the head of the coffin, and displayed a fair show of grief, joining in with vociferous weeping whenever the 'keening' was led by the older women. She was young enough to have been the dead man's daughter, having come to his house a 'slip' of a servant-girl, whom he had married and ruled over very masterfully.

As the night wore on, the whisky began to tell on those outside the room where the corpse lay. The noise increased, and soon apparently became loud enough to 'wake the dead,' as the saying is; for to the consternation and amazement of every one present, the defunct, after a deep sigh and sundry groans, opened his eyes and struggled up into a sitting posture. When the startled company had recovered from the shock, poor Tim was lifted out of the coffin; whisky was liberally poured down his throat; and well wrapped up in blankets and seated in the big chair by the fire, he gradually revived from the trance or stupor that had been mistaken for death. The last of the guests had departed from the cabin, and Tim, still propped up before the fire, was left to the care of his wife. Instead of coming near him however, she slunk off, cringing timidly away into a dark corner behind his chair, whence she directed frightened glances at her resuscitated spouse.

'Mary!' said the man in a stern voice.

No answer.

'Are you there?' peering round, his face quivering with anger and weakness.

'Yis, Tim, I'm here,' faltered Mary, without stirring.

'Bring me my stick.'

'Ah, no, Tim; no! Sure you never rose yer hand to me yet! And 'tisn't now, when you're all as one as come back from the dead, that'——

'Bring me my stick.'

The stick was brought, and down on her knees beside the big chair flopped the cowering wife.

'Well you know what you desarve. Well you know, you young thief o' the world! that if I was to take and beat you this blessed minute as black as a mourning-coach, 'twould be only sarving you right, after the mean, dirthy, shameful turn you've done me!'

'It would, it would!' sobbed the girl.

'Look here!' gasped Tim, opening his breast and shewing an old tattered shirt. 'Look at them rags! Look at what you dressed up my poor corpse in; shaming me before all the decent neighbours at the wake! An' you knowing as well as I did about the elegant brand-new shirt I'd bought o' purpose for my berrin; a shirt I wouldn't have put on my living back—no, not if I had gone naked in my skin! You knew I had it there in the chest laid up; and you grudged it to my unfortunate carcase when I couldn't spake up for myself!'

'O Tim, darlin', forgive me!' cried Mary. 'Forgive me this once, and on my two knees I promise never, never to do the likes again! I don't know what came over me at all. Sure, I think, the divil—Lord save us!—must have been at my elbow when I went to get out the shirt; tempting me, and whispering that it was a pity and a sin to put good linen like that into the clay. Oh, how could I do it at all?'

'Now, hearken to me, Mary;' and Tim raised the stick and laid it on her shoulder. She knew he wouldn't beat her even if he could with his trembling hands; but she pretended to wince and cower away. 'Mind what I say. As sure as you do me the like turn again, and go for to dress me in those undacent rags, I tell you what I'll do—I'll walk.'

'O don't, Tim, don't!' shrieked Mary, as pale as ashes. 'Murther me now, if it's plazing to you, or do anything to me you like; but for the love of the blessed Vargin and all the Saints, keep in yer grave! I'll put the new shirt on you; my two hands 'll starch it and make it up as white as snow, after lying by so long in the old chest. Yer corpse will look lovely, niver fear! And I'll give you the grandest wake that iver man had, even if I had to sell the pig, and part with every stick in the cabin to buy the tay and the whisky. I swear to you I will, darlin'. There's my hand on it, this blessed night!'

'Well, mind you do, or 'twill be worse for you. And now give me a drop of wather to drink, and put a taste of sperrits through it; for I'm like to faint with thirst and with weakness.'

Mary kept her promise; for such a wake was never remembered as Tim Scanlan's, when, soon after, the poor man really did depart this life. And the 'get up' of the 'elegant brand-new shirt' in which the corpse was arrayed, was the admiration of all beholders.