Then came more liquor and some singing. Christian sang too. He sang "Black-Eyed Sue," amid audible sobs.
"The voice he has, anyway; and the loud it is, and the tender, and the way he sliddhers up and down, and no squeaks and jumps; no, no, nothin' lek squeezin' a tune out of an ould sow by pullin' the tail at her, and a sorter of a rippin' up her innards to get the hook out of her gills."
"Aw, lovely he sang—lovely, uncommon."
"Well, I tould you so. I allis said it."
Kisseck listened to this dialogue at his end of the table with a lofty smile. "It's nothin'," he said, condescendingly. "That's nothin'. You should hear him out on the boat, when we're lyin' at anchor, and me and him together, and the stars just makin' a peep, and the moon, and the mar-fire, and all to that, and me and him lyin' aft and smokin' and havin' a glass maybe; but nothin' to do no harm at all—that's when you should hear him."
"More liquor there," shouted Tommy-Bill-beg, climbing with difficulty to his feet—"more liquor for the chair. And for some one beside—is that what they're saying? Well, look here! bad sess to it—of coorse, some for me too. It's terrible good for the narves, and they're telling me it's mortal good for studdyin' the vice. What's that from the chair? Enemy—eh? Confound it, that's true, though. What's that it's saying—'Who's fool enough to put the enemy into his mouth to stale away his brains?' Aw, now, it's the good ould Book that's fine at summin' it all up."
Still more liquor, and Jemmy Balladhoo comes forth with his fiddle. Immediate and complete capitulation of Tommy-Bill-beg ensues. The harbor-master never yet heard a squeak from his rival's fiddle; but the bare idea that Jemmy Quark Balladhoo should play it was really of itself too ridiculous.
"Aw, the rispen and the raspen. It's the moo of a cow he's on for making now. No? Then it's the sweet hoot of the donkey. Not that? Och, then it's safe to be the grunt of Jemmy's ould pig, anyways."
The violinist had by this time finished an elaborate movement, and called on the chairman to tell the company what it was. Christian, who had been hard put-to to preserve his gravity during the extraordinary musical display, and had not the very vaguest idea of what it was supposed to stand for, thought to get out of the difficulty by flattering the performer. "Oh, that?—what's that you say?—oh, of course—why that's, of course, the Pastoral Symphony from the 'Messiah.'"
"Not at all," shouted the irate fiddler, "it's 'Rule Britannia!'"