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“I saw a dramatic opportunity: would Tommy be willing to tell that story in his speech? He looked at me with an odd look–or so I imagined it! ‘Why not?’ says he; ‘I’d as soon as not tell it to anyone of them, and why not to them all together?’ Well, why not, when you come to think of it? So we have got it into the speech; and I, I myself, Sarah, am drilling young Demos-thenes, and he is so apt a scholar that I find myself rather pleasantly employed.” Having read her letter, Mrs. Carriswood hesitated a second and then added Derry’s information at the bottom of the page. “I suppose the lordly ancestor was one of King James’s creation–see Macaulay, somewhere in the second volume. I dare say there is a drop or two of good blood in the boy. He has the manners of a gentleman–but I don’t know that I ever saw an Irishman, no matter how low in the social scale, who hadn’t.”

Thus it happened that Tommy’s valedictory scored a success that is a tradition of the High School, and came to be printed in both the city papers; copies of which journals Tommy’s mother has preserved sacredly to this day; and I have no doubt, could one find them, they would be found wrapped around a yellow photograph of the “A Class” of 1870: eight pretty girls in white, smiling among five solemn boys in black, and Tommy himself, as the valedictorian, occupying the centre of the picture in his new suit of broadcloth, with a rose in his buttonhole and his hair cut by a professional barber for the occasion.

It was the story of the famine that really captured the audience; and Tommy told it well, with the true Irish fire, in a beautiful voice.

In the front seat of the parquette a little old man in a wrinkled black broadcloth, with a bald head and a fringe of whisker under his long chin, and a meek little woman, in a red Paisley shawl, wept and laughed by turns. They had taken the deepest interest in every essay and every speech. The old man clapped his large hands (which were encased in loose, black kid gloves) with unflagging vigor. He wore a pair of heavy boots, the soles of which made a noble thud on the floor.

“Ain’t it wonderful the like of them young craters can talk like that!” he cried; “shure, Molly, that young lady who’d the essay–where is it?”–a huge black forefinger travelled down the page–“‘ Music, The Turkish Patrol,’ No–though that’s grand, that piece; I’ll be spakin’ wid Professor Von Keinmitz to bring it when we’ve the opening. Here ’tis, Molly: ‘ Tin, Essay. The Darkest Night Brings Out the Stars, Miss Mamie Odenheimer.’ Thrue for you, mavourneen! And the sintiments, wasn’t they illigant? and the lan-gwidge was as foine as Pat Ronan’s speeches or Father–whist! will ye look at the flowers that shlip of a gyirl’s gitting! Count ’em, will ye?”

“Fourteen bouquets and wan basket,” says the little woman, “and Mamie Odenheimer, she got seventeen bouquets and two baskets and a sign. Well,” she looked anxious, but smiled, “I know of siven bouquets Tommy will git for sure. And that’s not countin’ what Harry Lossing will do for him. Hiven bless the good heart of him!”

“Well, I kin count four for him on wan seat,” says the man, with a nod of his head toward the gay heap in the woman’s lap, “barrin’ I ain’t on-vaygled into flinging some of thim to the young ladies!”

Harry Lossing, in the seat behind with his mother and Mrs. Carriswood, giggled at this and whispered in the latter lady’s ear, “That’s Tommy’s father and mother. My, aren’t they excited, though! And Tommy’s white’s a sheet–for fear he’ll disappoint them, you know. He has said his piece over twice to me, to-day, he’s so scared lest he’ll forget. I’ve got it in my pocket, and I’m going behind when it’s his turn, to prompt him. Did you see me winking at him? it sort of cheers him up.”