“Gwaith haiarn, sir; ym perthyn i Mr. Pearson. Mr. Pearson’s iron works, sir.”
I proceeded, and in about half-an-hour saw a man walking before me in the same direction in which I was. He was going very briskly, but I soon came up to him. He was a small, well-made fellow, with reddish hair and ruddy, determined countenance, somewhat tanned. He wore a straw hat, checkered shirt, open at the neck, canvas trowsers, and blue jacket. On his feet were shoes remarkably thin, but no stockings, and in his hand he held a stout stick, with which, just before I overtook him, he struck a round stone which lay on the ground, sending it flying at least fifty yards before him on the road, and following it in its flight with a wild and somewhat startling halloo.
“Good day, my friend,” said I; “you seem to be able to use a stick.”
“And sure I ought to be, your honour, seeing as how my father taught me, who was the best fighting man with a stick that the Shanavests ever had. Many is the head of a Caravaut that he has broken with some such an Alpeen wattle as the one I am carrying with me here.”
“A good thing,” said I, “that there are no Old Waistcoats and Cravats at present, at least bloody factions bearing those names.”
“Your honour thinks so! Faith! I am clane of a contrary opinion. I wish the ould Shanavests and Caravauts were fighting still; and I among them. Faith! there was some life in Ireland in their days.”
“And plenty of death too,” said I. “How fortunate it is that the Irish have the English among them, to prevent their cutting each other’s throats.”
“The English prevent the Irish from cutting each other’s throats! Well! if they do, it is only that they may have the pleasure of cutting them themselves. The bloody tyrants! too long has their foot been upon the neck of poor old Ireland.”
“How do the English tyrannise over Ireland?”
“How do they tyrannise over her? Don’t they prevent her from having the free exercise of her Catholic religion, and make her help to support their own Protestant one?”