Tom. No, Paddy, it is not that I mean. Was you sorry, or did you weep for her?
Teag. Weep for her! By Shaint Patrick, I would not weep, nor yet be sorry, suppose my own mother and all the women in Ireland had died seven years before I was born.
Tom. What did you do with your children when she died?
Teag. Do you imagine I was such a big fool as bury my children alive along with a dead woman? Arra, dear honey, we always commonly give nothing along with a dead person but an old shirt, a winding sheet, a big hammer, with a long candle, and an Irish silver threepenny piece.
Tom. Dear Paddy, and what do they make of all these things?
Teag. Then, Tom, since you are so inquisitive, you must go ask the priest.
Tom. What did you make of your children, Paddy?
Teag. And what should I make of them? Do you imagine that I should give them into the hands of the butchers, as they had been a parcel of young hogs. By Shaint Patrick, I had more unnaturality in me than to put them in an hospital as others do.
Tom. No; I suppose you would leave them with your friends?
Teag. Ay, ay, a poor man's friends is sometimes worse than a professed enemy. The best friend I ever had in the world was my own pocket while my money lasted; but I left two babes between the priest's door and the parish church, because I thought it was a place of mercy, and then set out for England in quest of another fortune.