Although I had no very precise notion, either as to the extent of the hardships done me, nor in what way I was to demand the reparation, I gave the assent he seemed to expect.
‘You are well acquainted with the language, I believe?’ continued he.
‘I can read and speak English tolerably well, sir.’
‘But I speak of Irish, boy—of the language which is spoken by your fellow-countrymen,’ said he rebukingly.
‘I have always heard, sir, that this has fallen into disuse, and is little known save among the peasantry in a few secluded districts.’
He seemed impatient as I said this, and referred once more to the paper before him, from whose minutes he appeared to have been speaking.
‘You must be in error, boy. I find here that the nation is devotedly attached to its traditions and literature, and feels no injury deeper than the insulting substitution of a foreign tongue for their own noble language.’
‘Of myself I know nothing, sir; the little I have learned was acquired when a mere child.’
‘Ah, then, you probably forget, or may never have heard the fact; but it is as I tell you. This, which I hold here, is the report of a highly distinguished and most influential personage, who lays great stress upon the circumstance. I am sorry, Tiernay, very sorry, that you are unacquainted with the language.’
He continued for some minutes to brood over this disappointment, and at last returned to the paper before him.