such a bland and delightful intoxication, that he finds himself making love just as naturally as he would eat his meals. It opens all the sluices of his heart, puts mercury in his veins, gives honey to a tongue that was, heaven knows, sufficiently sweet without it, and gifts him with a pair of feather heels that Mercury might envy; and to crown all, endows him, while pleading his cause in a quiet corner, with a fertility of invention, and an easy unembarrassed assurance, which nothing can surpass. In fact, with great respect for my friend Mr. Bunting, the fiddle it is that ought to be our national instrument, as it is that which is most closely and agreeably associated with the best and happiest impulses of the Irish heart. The very language of the people themselves is a proof of this; for whilst neither harp nor bagpipe is ever introduced as illustrating peculiarities of feeling by any reference to their influence, the fiddle is an agreeable instrument in their hands, in more senses than one. Paddy's highest notion of flattery towards the other sex is boldly expressed by an image drawn from it, for when he boasts that he can, by honied words, impress such an agreeable delusion upon his sweetheart as to make her imagine "that there is a fiddler on every rib of the house," there can be no metaphor conceived more strongly or beautifully expressive of the charm which flows from the tones of that sweet instrument. Paddy, however, is very often hit by his own metaphor, at a time when he least expects it. When pleading his cause, for instance, and promising golden days to his fair one, he is not unfrequently met by, "Ay, ay, it's all very well now; you're sugary enough, of coorse; but wait 'till we'd be a year married, an' maybe, like so many others that promised what you do, you'd never come home to me widout 'hangin' up your fiddle behind the door;"" by which she means to charge him with the probability of being agreeable when abroad, but morose in his own family.

Having thus shown that the fiddle and its music are mixed up so strongly with our language, feelings, and amusements, it

is now time to say something of the fiddler. In Ireland it is impossible, on looking through all the classes of society, to find any individual so perfectly free from care, or, in stronger words, so completely happy, as the fiddler, especially if he be blind, which he generally is. His want of sight circumscribes his other wants, and, whilst it diminishes his enjoyments, not only renders him unconscious of their loss, but gives a greater zest to those that are left him, simple and innocent as they are. He is in truth a man whose lot in life is happily cast, and whose lines have fallen in pleasant places. The phase of life which is presented to him, and in which he moves, is one of innocent mirth and harmless enjoyment. Marriages, weddings, dances, and merry-makings of all descriptions, create the atmosphere of mirth and happiness which he ever breathes. With the dark designs, the crimes, and outrages of mankind, he has nothing to do, and his light spirit is never depressed by their influence. Indeed, he may be said with truth to pass through none but the festivals of life, to hear nothing but mirth, to feel nothing but kindness, and to communicate nothing but happiness to all around him. He is at once the source and the centre of all good and friendly feelings. By him the aged man forgets his years, and is agreeably cheated back into youth; the labourer snatches a pleasant moment from his toil, and is happy; the care-worn ceases to remember the anxieties that press him down; the boy is enraptured with delight, and the child is charmed with a pleasure that he feels to be wonderful.

Surely such a man is important, as filling up with enjoyment so many of the pauses in human misery. He is a thousand times better than a politician, and is a true philosopher without knowing it. Every man is his friend, unless it be a rival fiddler, and he is the friend of every man, with the same exception. Every house, too, every heart, and every hand, is open to him; he never knows what it is to want a bed, a dinner, or a shilling. Good heavens! what more than this can the

cravings of a human heart desire! For my part, I do not know what others might aim at; but I am of opinion that in such a world as this, the highest proof of a wise man, would be, a wish to live and die an Irish fiddler.

And yet, alas! there is no condition of life without some remote or contingent sorrow. Many a scene have I witnessed connected with this very subject, that would wring the tears out of any eye, and find a tender pulse in the hardest heart. It is indeed a melancholy alternative that devotes the poor sightless lad to an employment that is ultimately productive of so much happiness to himself and others. This alternative is seldom resorted to, unless when some poor child,—perhaps a favorite -is deprived of sight by the terrible ravages of the small-pox. In life there is scarcely any thing more touching than to witness in the innocent invalid the first effects, both npon himself and his parents, of this woeful privation. The utter helplessness of the pitiable darkling, and his total dependence upon those around him-his unacquaintance with the relative situation of all the places that were familiar to him—his tottering and timid step, and his affecting call of "Mammy, where are you?" joined to the bitter consciousness on her part that the light of affection and innocence will never sparkle in those beloved eyes again-all this constitutes a scene of deep and bitter sorrow. When, however, the sense of his bereavement passes away, and the cherished child grows up to the proper age, a fiddle is procured for him by his parents, if they are able, and if not, a subscription is made up among their friends and neighbours to buy him one. All the family, with tears in their eyes, then kiss and take leave of him; and his mother, taking him by the hand, leads him, as had been previously arranged, to the best fiddler in the neighbourhood, with whom he is left as an apprentice. There is generally no fee required, but he is engaged to hand his master all the money he can make at dances, from the time he is proficient enough to play at them. Such is the

simple process of putting a blind boy in the way of becoming acquainted with the science of melody.

In my native parish there were four or five fiddlers—all Paganini of the district was the

good in their way; but the far-famed Mickey M'Rorey. Where Mickey properly lived, I never could actually discover, and for the best reason in the world-he was not at home once in twelve months. As Colley Cibber says in the play, he was "a kind of a here-andthereian-a stranger nowhere." This, however, mattered little; for though perpetually shifting day after day from place to place, yet it somehow happened that nobody ever was at a loss where to find him. The truth is, he never felt disposed to travel incog, because he knew that his interest must suffer by doing so; the consequence was, that wherever he went, a little nucleus of local fame always attended him, which rendered it an easy matter to find his whereabouts.

Mickey was blind from his infancy, and, as usual, owed to the small-pox the loss of his eye-sight. He was about the middle size, of rather a slender make, and possessed an intelligent countenance, on which beamed that singular expression of inward serenity so peculiar to the blind. His temper was sweet and even, but capable of rising through the buoyancy of his own humour to a high pitch of exhilaration and enjoyment. The dress he wore, as far as I can remember, was always the same in colour and fabric-to wit, a brown coat, a sober-tinted cotton waistcoat, grey stockings, and black corduroys. Poor Mickey! I think I see him before me; his head erect, as the heads of all blind men are, the fiddle-case under his left arm, and his hazel staff held out like a feeler, exploring with experimental pokes the nature of the ground before him, even although some happy urchin leads him onward with an exulting eye; an honour of which he will boast to his companions for many a mortal month to come.

The first time I ever heard Mickey play was also the first I

ever heard a fiddle. Well and distinctly do I remember the occasion. The season was summer-but summer was summer then—and a new house belonging to Frank Thomas had been finished, and was just ready to receive him and his family. The floors of Irish houses in the country generally consist at first of wet clay; and when this is sufficiently well smoothed and hardened, a dance is known to be an excellent thing to bind and prevent them from cracking. On this occasion the evening had been appointed, and the day was nearly half advanced, but no appearance of the fiddler. The state of excitement in which I found myself could not be described. The name of Mickey M Rorey had been ringing in my ears for God knows how long, but I had never seen him, or even heard his fiddle. Every two minutes I was on the top of a little eminence looking out for him, my eyes straining out of their sockets, and my head dizzy with the prophetic expectation of rapture and delight. Human patience, however, could bear this painful suspense no longer, and I privately resolved to find Mickey, or perish. I accordingly proceeded across the hills, a distance of about three miles, to a place called Kilnahushogue, where I found him waiting for a guide. At this time I could not have been more than seven years of age; and how I wrought out my way over the lonely hills, or through what mysterious instinct I was led to him, and that by a path, too, over which I had never travelled before, must be left unrevealed, until it shall please that Power which guides the bee to its home, and the bird for thousands of miles through the air, to disclose the principle upon which it is accomplished.

On our return home I could see the young persons of both sexes flying out to the little eminence I spoke of, looking eagerly towards the spot we travelled from, and immediately scampering in again, clapping their hands and shouting with delight. Instantly the whole village was out, young and old, standing for a moment to satisfy themselves that the in