The warm summer air was so clear that the hamlet of Muirisc, whose gray walls, embroidered with glossy vines, and tiny cottages white with lime-wash were crowded together on the very edge of the shore, seemed close beside them, and every grunt and squawk from sty or barn-yard came over the lapping waters to them as from a sounding-board. The village, engirdled by steep, sheltering cliffs, and glistening in the sunlight, made a picture which artists would have blessed their stars for. The two men in the boat looked at it wearily.
“Egor, it’s my belafe,” said the fisher at the bow, after what seemed an age of idle silence, “that the fishes have all follied the byes an’ gerrels, an’ betaken thimselves to Ameriky.” He pulled in his line, and gazed with disgust at the intact bait. “Luk at that, now!” he continued. “There’s a male fit for the holy Salmon of Knowledge himsilf, that taught Fin MacCool the spache of animals, and divil a bite has the manest shiner condiscinded to make at it.”
“Oh, darn the fish!” replied the other, with a long sigh. “I don’t care whether we catch’ any or not. It’s worth while to come out here even if we never get a nibble and baked ourselves into bricks, jest to get rid of that infernal O’Daly.”
It was The O’Mahony who spake, and he invested the concluding portion of his remark with an almost tearful earnestness. During the pause which ensued he chewed vigorously upon the tobacco in his mouth, and spat into the sea with a stern expression of countenance.
“I tell you what, Jerry,” he broke out with at last—“I can’t stand much more of that fellow. He’s jest breakin’ me up piecemeal. I begin to feel like Jeff Davis—that it ’ud have bin ten dollars in my pocket if I’d never bin born.”
“Ah, sure, your honor,” said Jerry, “ye’ll git used to it in time. He manes for the best.”
“That’s jest what makes me tired,” rejoined The O’Mahony; “that’s what they always said about a fellow when he makes a confounded nuisance of himself. I hate fellows that mean for the best. I’d much rather he meant as bad as he knew how. P’raps then he’d shut up and mind his own business, and leave me alone part of the time. It’s bad enough to have your estate mortgaged up to the eyebrows, but to have a bard piled on top o’ the mortgages—egad, it’s more’n flesh and blood can stand! I don’t wonder them other O’Mahonys took to drink.”
“There’s a dale to be said for the dhrink, your honor,” commented the other, tentatively.
“There can be as much said as you like,” said The O’Mahony, with firmness, “but doin’ is a hoss of another color. I’m goin’ to stick to the four drinks a day an’ two at night; an’ what’s good enough for me’s good enough for you. That bat of ours the first week we come settled the thing. I said to myself: ‘There’s goin’ to be one O’Mahony that dies sober, or I’ll know the reason why!’”
“Egor, Saint Pether won’t recognize ye, thin,” chuckled Jerry; and the other grinned grimly in spite of himself.