“And succeeding in all your ends by such noble means must be doubly gratifying—and is doubly commendable and surprising,” said Sir Ulick.
“May I ask—for it’s my turn now to play ignoramus—may I ask, what noble means excites this gratuitous commendation and surprise?”
“I commend, in the first place, the economy of your ploughing tackle—hay ropes, hay traces, and hay halters—doubly useful and convenient for harness and food.”
Corny replied, “Some people I know, think the most expensive harness and tackle, and the most expensive ways of doing every thing, the best; but I don’t know if that is the way for the poor to grow rich—it may be the way for the rich to grow poor: we are all poor people in the Black Islands, and I can’t afford, or think it good policy, to give the example of extravagant new ways of doing old things.”
“‘Tis a pity you don’t continue the old Irish style of ploughing by the tail,” said Sir Ulick.
“That is against humanity to brute bastes, which, without any sickening palaver of sentiment, I practise. Also, it’s against an act of parliament, which I regard sometimes—that is, when I understand them; which, the way you parliament gentlemen draw them up, is not always particularly intelligible to plain common sense; and I have no lawyers here, thank Heaven! to consult: I am forced to be legislator, and lawyer, and ploughman, and all, you see, the best I can for myself.”
He opened the window, and called to give some orders to the man, or, as he called him, the boy—a boy of sixty—who was ploughing.
“Your team, I see, is worthy of your tackle,” pursued Sir Ulick—“A mule, a bull, and two lean horses. I pity the foremost poor devil of a horse, who must starve in the midst of plenty, while the horse, bull, and even mule, in a string behind him, are all plucking and munging away at their hay ropes.”
Cornelius joined in Sir Ulick’s laugh, which shortened its duration.
“‘Tis comical ploughing, I grant,” said he, “but still, to my fancy, any thing’s better and more profitable nor the tragi-comic ploughing you practise every sason in Dublin.”