"And av coorse it's goin' to the berrin, you are, Mr. Coogan, and long life to you."
"Aye, boys.—It's hard for an owld horse to leave off his thricks."
"Owld is it?—faix and it's yourself that has more heart in you this blessed mornin' than many a man that's not half your age."
"By dad I'm not a cowlt, boys, though I kick up my heels sometimes."
"Well, you'll never do it younger, sir,—but sure why wouldn't you be there when all the counthry is goin' I hear, and no wondher sure.—By the hole in my hat it's enough, so it is, to make a sick man lave his bed to see the fun that'll be in it, and sure it's right and proper, and shows the sperit that's in the counthry, when a man like yourself, Mr. Coogan, joins the poor people in doin' it."
"I like to stand up for the right," answered the old man.
"And always was a good warrant to do that same," said Larry, in his most laudatory tone.
"Will you tell us who's that forninst us an the road there?" asked the old man, as he pointed to a person that seemed to make his way with some difficulty, for he laboured under an infirmity of limb that caused a grotesque jerking action in his walk, if walk it might be called.
"Why, thin, don't you know him, Mr. Coogan? by dad I thought there wasn't a parish in the country that didn't know poor Hoppy Houligan."
It has been often observed before, the love of soubriquet that the Irish possess; but let it not be supposed that their nicknames are given in a spirit of unkindness—far from it. A sense of the ridiculous is so closely interwoven in an Irishman's nature, that he will even jest upon his own misfortunes; and while he indulges in a joke (one of the few indulgences he can command), the person that excites it may as frequently be the object of his openheartedness as his mirth.