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Show I LONESOME IRISH LASS. I A i Had ,0nly the Gaelic Language and a 4) Shilling to Begin New World With. & A lonesome, blue-eyed little Irish girl v from County Gal way landed the other 4 dsy at the barge office in New York from the White Star line . steamship Teutonic. She would not haA-e been so A lonesome if she had not been the only o person in the ship's company Avho had X no English. There Avas . not 7 aV soul Y among all the Irish immigrants, Avho y could talk the Gaelic Avith her, and she 4 made herself understood by signs and a smiles. She had so many of the latter J that she made friends of all .the Irish aboard, who all regretted for her sake 6 that they were , not of the stock that A have regained a knowledge of the Ian- Y guage of their fathers. - All the baggage the child had was f a big valise, and all the money she dis- k played to the inspectors Avas a bright J r , i shilling piece. The interpreters tried to make out Avhat Avas her object in coming com-ing to America. None of them succeeded. suc-ceeded. Then somebody recalled that , Peter Groden, the barge office plainclothes plain-clothes cop, Avas an expert in Gaelic. ' He was sent for and came in a hurry. There is nothing delights Peter more than talking Gaelic. The girl opened her eyes Avhen Peter began crooning to hex in her only . tongue. Then her smile broke out like 1 a sunburst, and she clasped her hands " about Peter's neck, greeting him as a cousin. Peter is not her cousin, but she considered that anybody Avho conld talk . her language in America must be at least a cousin. Peter Avas much impressed Avith the girl. S" told him between smiles that she Avas Bridget Coughrey. and that ' she Avas the eldest of five children. I Her parents rent a farm at Clifden. County Gahvay, for Avhich they pay ! $80 a year. She had learned from let- : ters In Gaelic Avritten by her uncle, Patrick Coughrey of Pittsburg, that there A-as a chance in America for an energetic girl to make a good liA-ing. and she had persuaded her father and mother to let her come to her uncle. They said they would and the uncle sent her a ticket entitling her to passage pass-age from QueenstoAvn to Xcav York aboard the Teutonic. She told Peter that times Avere hard at Clifden and she expected to make enough by working work-ing in Pittsburg to pay a good part of the yearly rental of the Galway farm. Peter took her over to the Mission of Our Lady of the Rosary at 7 State street and Father Henry took care of her. She said that the buildings in the loAA'er part of the toAvn Avere much bigger big-ger and finer than any at Clifden or Cork. Her uncle has been asked to send her fare to Pittsburg. He probably will, but if he does not, Bridget will be sent to Pitsburgt at the expense of the mission. |