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                             THE O'RUDDY

                             _A ROMANCE_


                                  BY

                            STEPHEN CRANE

            _Author of "The Red Badge of Courage," "Active
                Service," "Wounds in the Rain," etc._

                                 AND

                             ROBERT BARR

            _Author of "Tekla," "In the Midst of Alarms,"
               "Over the Border," "The Victors," etc._



                        _With frontispiece by_

                            C. D. WILLIAMS





                               NEW YORK

                     FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY

                              PUBLISHERS





                          _Copyright, 1903,_

                    BY FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY

       *       *       *       *       *




THE O'RUDDY

CHAPTER I


My chieftain ancestors had lived at Glandore for many centuries and
were very well known. Hardly a ship could pass the Old Head of Kinsale
without some boats putting off to exchange the time of day with her,
and our family name was on men's tongues in half the seaports of
Europe, I dare say. My ancestors lived in castles which were like
churches stuck on end, and they drank the best of everything amid the
joyous cries of a devoted peasantry. But the good time passed away
soon enough, and when I had reached the age of eighteen we had nobody
on the land but a few fisher-folk and small farmers, people who were
almost law-abiding, and my father came to die more from disappointment
than from any other cause. Before the end he sent for me to come to
his bedside.

"Tom," he said, "I brought you into existence, and God help you safe
out of it; for you are not the kind of man ever to turn your hand to
work, and there is only enough money to last a gentleman five more
years.

"The 'Martha Bixby,' she was, out of Bristol for the West Indies, and
if it hadn't been for her we would never have got along this far with
plenty to eat and drink. However, I leave you, besides the money, the
two swords,--the grand one that King Louis, God bless him, gave me,
and the plain one that will really be of use to you if you get into a
disturbance. Then here is the most important matter of all.