“Was he a member of the Royal Family then, or some one born with a silver spoon in his mouth, and no more brains in his head than you’d find with a sparrow?”
“He was no way connected with royalty or the aristocracy, but a decent man who always worked for a living, one Lareen, the birdcatcher from Duhallow.”
“And what’s the use fretting about any one who is dead and gone? Sure we must all die, and maybe there will be no one fretting about ourselves.”
“There is some truth in that, but we can’t always be as philosophic as we pretend to be.”
“And was Lareen of such importance that you can’t forget him, now that he’s gone to his reward or his deserts, as the case may be?”
“Well,” said Micus, “Lareen was a Murphy on his father’s side and a Cassidy on his mother’s, and both families were noted the world over for their love of sport, black pudding, and fresh drisheens. And Lareen, like his father and grandfather, was a birdcatcher by nature and a shoemaker by profession, and he always made boots and shoes for the parish priest and the minister, and he used to collect the money at the chapel door on Sundays. There was no man in the seven parishes who could blow the organ for vespers better than himself, but the devil a bit he ever got for all he did for others, except that he contracted rheumatics from walking in the rain while attending funerals of the poor. However, that same had its compensations, because it helped him to remember that he wasn’t long for this life, and that he had a soul to save and a wife and family to support. But to go on with my story. One fine morning, as I was reading the newspaper that I got the lend of from the public house opposite the pump at the bend of the road, who should come into the house but Lareen himself, and there and then he up and ses: ‘Good morning, Micus,’ ses he.
“‘Good morning kindly, Lareen,’ ses I. ‘What’s the good word?’
“‘Nothing in particular,’ ses he.
“‘Have you no news at all?’ ses I.