“Very well thin! I’ll ax two kinds iv things, an’ yer ’an’r will tell me which ye’d like the best!”

“All right, go on.”

“Long or short?”

“Tall; not short, certainly.”

“Fat or lane?”

“Fie! fie! Andy, for shame; you talk as if they were cattle or pigs.”

“Begor, there’s only wan kind iv fat an’ lane that I knows of; but av ye like I’ll call it thick or thin; which is it?”

“Not too fat, but certainly not skinny.” Andy held up his hands in mock horror:—

“Yer ’an’r shpakes as if ye was talkin’ iv powlthry.”

“I mean Andy,” said I with a certain sense of shame, “she is not to be either too fat or too lean, as you put it.”