“HE KEPT HIS EYE TO THE WINDOW, AND IF THEY TURNED FROM THE DIRECT LINE OF THE ROAD, HE SLIPPED INTO BED.”
“Go way wid yees, boys, till I spake to Ellish here about the affairs o’ the nation. Why, Ellish, you stand the cut all to pieces. By the contints o’ the book, you do; Pether doesn’t stand it half so well. How is he, the thief?”
“Throth, he’s not well to-day, in regard of a smotherin’ about the heart he tuck this morning, afther his breakfast. He jist laid himself on the bed a while, to see if it would go off of him—God be praised for all his marcies!”
“Thin, upon my solevation, I’m sorry to hear it, and so will all at home, for there’s not in the parish we’re sittin’ in a couple that our family has a greater regard an’ friendship for than him an’ yourself. Faix, my modher, no longer ago than Friday night last, argued down Bartle Meegan’s throath that you and Biddy Martin war the two portliest weemen that comes into the chapel. God forgive myself, I was near quarrellin’ wid Bartle, on the head of it, bekase I tuck my modher’s part, as I had good right to do.”
“Thrath, I’m thankful to you both, Condy, for your kindness.”
“Oh, the sarra taste o’ kindness was in it all, Ellish, ’twas only the thruth; an’ as long as I live I’ll stand up for that.”
“Arrah, how is your aunt down at Carntall?”
“Indeed, thin, but middlin’, not gettin’ her health: she’ll soon give the crow a puddin’, anyway; thin, Ellish, you thief, I’m in for the yallow boys. Do you know thim that came in wid me?”
“Why, thin, I can’t say I do. Who are they, Condy?”
“Why, one o’ thim’s a bachelor to my sisther Norah, a very dacent boy, indeed—him wid the frieze jock upon him, an’ the buckskin breeches. The other three’s from Teenabraighera beyant. They’re related to my brother-in-law, Mick Dillon, by his first wife’s brother-in-law’s uncle. They’re come to this neighbourhood till the ’Sizes, bad luck to them, goes over; for, you see, they’re in a little throuble.”