Teag. Dear shoy, it was not; but for being too inquisitive, and going sharply about business. First, he sent me to the post-office to enquire if there were any letters for him; so when I came there, said I, is there any letters here for my master to-day? Then they asked who was my master; sir, said I, it is very bad manners in you to ask any gentleman’s name; at this they laughed, mocking me, and said they could give me none, if I would not tell my master’s name; so I returned to my master and told him the impudence of the fellow, who would give me no letters unless I would tell him your name, master. My master at this flew in a passion, and kicked me down stairs, saying, go you rogue, and tell my name directly, how can the gentleman give letters when he knows not who is asking for them. Then I returned and told my master’s name, so they told me there was one for him. I looked at it, being very small, and asking the price of it, they told me it was sixpence: sixpence, said I, will you take sixpence for that small thing, and selling bigger ones for twopence; faith I am not such a big fool; you think to cheat me now, this is not a conscionable way of dealing, I’ll acquaint my master with it first; so I came and told my master how they would have sixpence for his letter, and was selling bigger ones for twopence; he took up my head and broke his cane with it, calling me a thousand fools, saying, the man was more just than to take any thing but the right for it; but I was sure there was none of them right, buying and selling such dear penny-worths. So I came again for my dear sixpence letter; and as the fellow wus shuffling through a parcel of them, seeking for it again, to make the best of a dear market, I pict up two, and home I comes to my master, thinking he would be pleased with what I had done; now, said I, master, I think I have put a trick upon them fellows, for selling the letter to you. What have you done? I have only taken other two letters: here’s one for you master, to help your dear penny-worth, and I’ll send the other to my mother to see whether she be dead or alive, for she’s always angry I don’t write to her. I had not the word well spoken, till he got up his stick and beat me heartily for it, and sent me back to the fellows again with the two. I had a very ill will to go, but nobody would buy them of me.
Tom. Well, Paddy, I think you was to blame, and your master too, for he ought to have taught you how to go about these affairs, and not beat you so.
Teag. Arra dear honey, I had too much wit of my own to be teached by him, or any body else; he began to instruct me after that how I should serve the table, and such nasty things as those: one night I took ben a roasted fish in one hand, and a piece of bread in the other; the old gentleman was so saucy he would not take it, and told me I should bring nothing to him without a trencher below it. The same night as he was going to bed, he called for his slippers and pish-pot, so I clapt a trencher below the pish-pot, and another below the slippers, and ben I goes, one in every hand; no sooner did I enter the room than he threw the pish-pot at me, which broke both my head and the pish-pot at one blow; now, said I, the devil is in my master altogether, for what he commands at one time he countermands at another. Next day I went with him to the market to buy a sack of potatoes, I went to the potatoe-monger, and asked what he took for the full of a Scot’s cog, he weighed them in, he asked no less than fourpence; fourpence, said I, if I were but in Dublin, I could got the double of that for nothing, and in Cork and Linsale far cheaper; them is but small things like pease, said I, but the potatoes in my country is as big as your head, fine meat, all made up in blessed mouthfuls; the potatoe-merchant called me a liar, and my master called me a fool, so the one fell a-kicking me, and the other a cuffing me, I was in such bad bread among them, that I called myself both a liar and a fool to get off alive.
Tom. And how did you carry your potatoes home from the market.
Teag. Arra dear shoy, I carried the horse and them both, besides a big loaf, and two bottles of wine; for I put the old horse on my back, and drove the potatoes before me, and when I tied the load to the loaf, I had nothing to do but to carry the bottle in my hand: but bad luck to the way as I came home, for a nail out of the heal of my foot sprung a leak in my brogue, which pricked the very bone, bruised the skin, and made my brogue itself to blood, and I having no hammer by me, but a hatchet I left at home, I had to beat down the nail with the bottom of the bottle: and by the book, dear shoy, it broke to pieces, and scattered the wine in my mouth.
Tom. And how did you recompense your master for the loss of the bottle of wine?
Teag. Arra dear shoy, I had a mind to cheat him and myself too, for I took the bottle to a blacksmith, and desired him to mend it that I might go to the butcher and get it full of bloody water, but he told me he could not work in any thing but steel and iron. Arra, said I, if I were in my own kingdom, I could get a blacksmith who would make a bottle out of a stone, and a stone out of nothing.
Tom. And how did you trick your master out of it?
Teag. Why the old rogue began to chide me, asking me what way I broke it, then I held up the other as high as my head, and let it fall to the ground on a stone, which broke it all in pieces likewise: now said I, master, that’s the way, and he beat me very heartily until I had to shout out mercy and murder all at once.