So as we journeyed along he talked a sight about Wallace and that claymore of hisen. “Why,” sez he, “it must have weighed 4 hundred or 5 hundred pounds. What a man he wuz to wield it as he did and cut down his enemies with it!
“Why,” sez he, “it would take two common men to lift it, they say, and what a sight it must have been to see him swingin’ that round his head and mowin’ down his enemies jest as Ury would mow down oats!”
Sez I, “Josiah, I hope you are too good to enjoy sech a blood-curdlin’ sight, if it ever took place, but you must be careful about believin’ everything you hear about Wallace. I suppose that, like King Arthur, an old Illiad that Thomas J. ust to read about so much, lots of things has been told about him that never took place.”
“Take care, Samantha; I can stand a good deal from a pardner, but when you go to doubtin’ William Wallace, then is the time for a man to take a stand.
“Why, you’ll be a-doubtin’ ‘Thaddeus of Warsaw’ next. I wuz brung up on them books,” sez he, “and on them books I take my stand. If I’d hefted that claymore myself, I couldn’t believe in it any more ’n I do.”
Sez I, a-tryin’ to bring him back into the plains of megumness and reason—
“You know history sez that Wallace wuz a sheep-stealer, in the first place. Don’t pin your faith onto him too much, Josiah Allen.”
“A sheep-stealer!”
Wall, I will pin up a heavy shawl between Josiah Allen and the public for the next few minutes. I guess I’ll hang up my Paisley shawl, that’s pretty thick, and I too will withdraw myself behind it.
Suffice it to say when we emerged from behind it, I wuz a-sayin’—