"Ah, I hope you will come," he urged, seeing that we hesitated. "When I was in America, the welcome I got was so warm and open-hearted, that I feel I am forever indebted to all Americans, and it is a great pleasure to me when I am able to repay a little of that kindness. It's few opportunities I have, and I hope you won't refuse me this one."
So we accepted the invitation, telling him how kind we thought it, and started back through the streets, with the women and children courtesying to our guide as we passed, and he never failing to give them a pleasant word.
"'Tis not to my own quarters I'll be taking you," he explained, "but to those of a brother priest, who will be proud to have them put to this use," and he stopped in front of a row of little houses, called St. Joseph's Terrace, and opened the door of one of them, and ushered us in, and called the old servant, and bade her get us tea.
It was served in a bare little dining-room--with bread and butter and jam and cake--and very good it tasted, though the tea was far too strong for us, and we had to ask for some hot water with which to weaken it. Our host laughed at us; he drank his straight, without milk or sugar, and he told us about the first time he ordered tea in New York. When he started to pour it, he thought the cook had forgot to put any tea in the pot, so he called the waiter and sent it back; and the waiter, who was Irish and understood, laughed and took the pot back and put some more tea in.
"It was still far too weak," went on our host; "but I was ashamed to say anything more, so I drank it, though I might as well have been drinking hot water. Indeed, I got no good tea in America. And I nearly burnt my mouth off me once, trying to eat ice-cream. I took a great spoonful, without knowing what it would be like, and I thought it would be the death of me. And I shall never forget the first time they served Indian corn. It was in great long ears, such as I had never seen before; and I had no idea how to eat it, so I said it didn't agree with me; and then I was astonished to see the other people at the table--educated, cultured people they were, too--pick it up in their fingers and gnaw it off just as an animal would! Ah, that was a strange sight!"