'If Mr. Curran will apologise----' Lord Clare began, glancing nervously round, for it was nearly dark, and the mob was thickening fast.
'Ah! Go on, now; it's joking ye're,' shouted Cassidy, holding his sides. 'Your lordship's too polite entirely. Sure ye couldn't do it. Here are the rules laid down by the Knights of Tara, which you know may not be broke' (taking a small manuscript book out of his voluminous breeches-pocket). 'See No. 7: "No apology can be accepted after the parties meet, without a fire." Come, gintlemin. Proceed, proceed. Ould locks--barrels and stocks! Go on, du now! Here are your pair of bullies, nicely primed, my lord.'
'One will be sufficient, probably,' frowned his principal.
'Rule 33,' retorted the glib fire-eater: '"You may not be satisfied till two shots are fired at least, unless the apologiser hands the other a cane and submits to a good beating."'
'That's a Galway rule, which doesn't obtain in Dublin,' Terence remarked. 'Not that my principal means to apologise; far from it.'
'Irish blackguard is one of our staple manufactures,' suggested Mr. Curran, to keep the ball rolling; but his adversary was imperturbable. He was a cur as well as a tyrant, then?
'Listen to me, my lord,' cried the sturdy advocate, crossing his arms. 'In 1173, MacMurrough betrayed the land to Strongbow, as you are betraying it now to Pitt, and received the wages of sin. Take a lesson from history. Hunted by despair, he died by his own hand. Under Henry II. England and Ireland were for a moment one. But England grew sick of the faint smell of the shambles, and abandoned her slave. Much good did that Union do!'
Lord Clare was stung to desperation. Openly to talk of a Union at this juncture might be productive of incalculable harm.
'Make haste, make haste!' he said pettishly. 'We don't want all the metropolis to look at us.'
The first shot did no mischief. The chancellor fired wide, his wandering bullet creating a transitory excitement in a knot of bystanders. Mr. Curran's pierced his adversary's coat.