Father and Son by Charles Dickens

One evening in the month of March, 1798, -- that dark time in Ireland's annals whose memory (overlooking all minor subsequent _emeutes_) is still preserved among us, as "the year of the rebellion" -- a lady and gentleman were seated near a blazing fire in the old-fashioned dining-room of a large lonely mansion. They had just dined; wine and fruit were on the table, both untouched, while Mr. Hewson and his wife sat silently gazing at the fire, watching its flickering light becoming gradually more vivid as the short Spring twilight faded into darkness.

At length the husband poured out a glass of wine, drank it off, and then broke silence, by saying --