“Blazin' hot—hotter than yesterday—'hotter than New Orleens,' Mr. Quackinbosh says.”

“D—n Mr. Quackinbosh, and New Orleens too!” growled out O'Shea.

“With all my heart. He's always laughing at what he calls my Irish, as if it was n't better than his English.”

“Any strangers arrived?”

“Devil a one. Ould Pagnini says he 'll be ruined entirely; there never was such a set, he says, in the house before,—nothing called for but the reg'lar meals, and no wine but the drink of the country, that is n't wine at all.”

“He's an insolent scoundrel!”

“He is not. He is the dacentest man I seen since I come to Italy.”

“Will you hold your prate, or do you want me to kick you downstairs?”

“I do not!” said he, with a stern doggedness that was almost comic.

“Did you order breakfast?”