Tom. What was the matter, was you guilty of nothing?
Teag. Arra, dear honey, I did harm to nobody? but fancied an old gentleman’s gun, and afterwards made it my own.
Tom. Very well boy, and did you keep it so?
Teag. Keep it, I would have kept it with all my heart while I lived, death itself could not have parted us, but the old rogue, the gentleman, being a justice of the peace himself, had me tried for the rights of it, and how I came by it, and so took it again.
Tom. And how did you clear yourself without punishment?
Teag. Arra, dear shoy, I told him a parcel of lies, but they would not believe me; for I said that I got it from my father when it was a little pistol, and I had keeped it till it had grown a gun, and was designed to use it well until it had grown a big cannon, and then sell it to the military. They all fell a laughing at me as I had been a fool, and bade me go home to my mother and clean the potatoes.
Tom. How long is it since you left your own country?
Teag. Arra, dear honey, I do not mind whether it be a fortnight or four months, but I think myself, it is a long time; they tell me my mother is dead since, but I won’t believe it, until I get a letter from her own hand, for she is a very good scholar, suppose she can neither write nor read.
Tom. Was you ever in England before?
Teag. Ay, that I was, and in Scotland too.