perhaps never see again; yet with all his vast erudition he had his prejudices and superstitions; he believed in apparitions, and he despised all countries save his own.—The Scotch and Irish he affected particularly to dislike.—In his poem of “London,” in imitation of Juvenal, he says,—
For who unbrib'd would leave Hibernia's land, Or change the rocks of Scotland for the Strand?— There none are swept by sudden death away, But all whom Hunger spares, with age decay!
But, with all his foibles, (and who is there without human infirmity?) Doctor Samuel Johnson was the most highly talented writer of any age or nation.”
Facing the Obelisk, “let us stroll down the market,” said Dashall, “considered the cheapest in London.—Flesh, fish and fowl, fruits, roots and vegetables, are here abundantly attainable, and at moderate prices.”
Amongst the various venders, our two observers passed on, unmolestedly, excepting the annoyance and importunity of “What d'ye buy? what d'ye buy, buy, buy?” from” barking butchers, who instinctively reiterated the phrase as the casual passenger approached, like so many parrots, unconscious of its import being unproductive in effect; for who would be induced to purchase by the clamorous invitation universally in use by these vociferous butchers of the metropolis?—“My fine fellow,” observed Tallyho to one who annoyed him, “good wine, they say, needs no bush, neither does good meat require a barker.”
“Bad luck to my mother's own daughter, and that is myself, sure,” exclaimed a retail venderess of vegetables, to her opponent in trade, “if I wouldn't for the value of a tester, or for the value of nothing at all at all, give you freely just what you ask for my jewel.—Arrah now, is it law that you want of me! Faith and troth then you shall have it, club-law, when and where you plase, my darling!”
“Dirty end,” rejoined the other lady, “to the girl who fear* you!—Here am I, Kate, of the Maclusky's of Ballymena, in the county of Antrim, long life to it! and it would be a hard case, and a shameful one to boot, if a well educated northern lass should suffer her own self to be disgraced by a Munster-woman.”
“The devil fly away with Ballymena, and the Macluskys along with it!” retorted the other; “and is it Munster and heddication that you are bothering about? Whillaloe graraachree! my sweet one! and did you begin your larning in Ballymena, and come to finish it in Fleet-market? By my conscience, Kate Maclusky, if you are not very much belied, you know more than you ought to do.”
“And what would you 'sinuate by that?” demanded Kate;—“What do you ?sinuate by that, Ma'am?—I acknowledge that I'm both a whore and a thief—what then? Bating that I defy you to say, black is the white of my eye!”
Here Mrs. Maclusky with arms a-kimbo, and a visage strongly expressing exasperation and defiance, advanced towards the Munster-woman.