“Yis. Nayther snake nor toad in owld Oireland,—nayther could live for a single hour, if ye plants them thare. The green island wudn’t contain thim bekase they’re condimned to die the moment they sit fut on the sod.”
“But what condemn dem?”
“Saint Pathrick, to be shure. Trath, thare’s a story about that. May be yez wud loike to be afther hearin’ it, Mozey?”
“Like um berry much, Massy Tum.”
“Will, thin, I’ll till it to yer. It isn’t such a wondherful story as yours; but it had a betther indin’, as yer’ll see when ye’ve heerd it. Instid av the snakes killin’ all the people exciptin’ wan, the riptiles got killed thimsilves, all but wan,—that was the father of ivry sirpint in the world. He’s livin’ yit, an’ must now be about five thousand years uv age. So the praste sez.
“A long toime ago, owld Oireland was very badly infisted wid thim craythers. They wur so thick all over the swate island, that yez cudn’t sit your fut down widout triddin’ on wan av their tails; an’ to kape out av their way the people had to build a great scaffoldin’ that extinded all over the counthry, and slape on the threes, just as we’ve been doin’ over the gyapo.
“Whiniver they wanted anythin’ to ate, such as purtaties, an’ the loike, they were compilled to git it up from the ground wid long forks; and whin they wur in need to dhrink, they had to dip it up in buckets, as if they were drawin’ it out av a well.
“Av coorse this was moighty inconvanient, an’ cudn’t last long no how. The worst ov it was, that the snakes, instid ov gettin’ thinned off, were ivery year growin’ thicker, by razin ov their large families ov young wuns. Will, it got so bad at last that ther’ wusn’t a spot av groun’ bigger than the bunch ov your hand that warn’t occupoyed by a snake, an’ in some places they were two deep. The people up on the platform that I towld yez about, they cursed an’ swore, an’ raged, an’ raved, an’ at last prayed to be delivered from the inimy.”
Here Tom paused to note the effect of his speech on his sable listener.
“But dey war delibbered,—wur dey?”