“You know as much, I think,” said Hardress, “of farming as of hair-cutting.”
“Oyeh, if I had nothin’ to depend upon but what heads comes across me this way, sir, I’d be in a poor way enough. But I have a little spot o’ ground besides.”
“And a good taste for the produce.”
“’Twas kind father for me to have that same. Did you ever hear tell, sir, of what they call limestone broth?”
“Never.”
“’Twas my father first made it. I’ll tell you the story, sir, if you’ll turn your head this way a minute.”
Hardress had no choice but to listen.
“My father went once upon a time about the country, in the idle season, seeing would he make a penny at all by cutting hair, or setting razhurs and penknives, or any other job that would fall in his way. Well an’ good—he was one day walking alone in the mountains of Kerry, without a hai’p’ny in his pocket (for though he travelled a-foot, it cost him more than he earned), an’ knowing there was but little love for a county Limerick man in the place where he was, on being half perished with the hunger, an’ evening drawing nigh, he didn’t know well what to do with himself till morning. Very good—he went along the wild road; an’ if he did, he soon sees a farmhouse at a little distance o’ one side—a snug-looking place, with the smoke curling up out of the chimney, an’ all tokens of good living inside. Well, some people would live where a fox would starve. What do you think did my father do? He wouldn’t beg (a thing one of our people never done yet, thank heaven!) an’ he hadn’t the money to buy a thing, so what does he do? He takes up a couple o’ the big limestones that were lying on the road in his two hands, an’ away with him to the house. ‘Lord save all here!’ says he, walkin’ in the doore. ‘And you kindly,’ says they. ‘I’m come to you,’ says he, this way, looking at the two limestones, ‘to know would you let me make a little limestone broth over your fire, until I’ll make my dinner?’ ‘Limestone broth!’ says they to him again; ‘what’s that, aroo?’ ‘Broth made o’ limestone,’ says he; ‘what else?’ ‘We never heard of such a thing,’ says they. ‘Why, then, you may hear it now,’ says he, ‘an’ see it also, if you’ll gi’ me a pot an’ a couple o’ quarts o’ soft water.’ ‘You can have it an’ welcome,’ says they. So they put down the pot an’ the water, an’ my father went over an’ tuk a chair hard by the pleasant fire for himself, an’ put down his two limestones to boil, and kep stirrin’ them round like stirabout. Very good—well, by-an’-by, when the wather began to boil—‘’Tis thickening finely,’ says my father; ‘now if it had a grain o’ salt at all, ’twould be a great improvement to it’ ‘Raich down the salt-box, Nell,’ says the man o’ the house to his wife. So she did. ‘Oh, that’s the very thing, just,’ says my father, shaking some of it into the pot. So he stirred it again awhile, looking as sober as a minister. By-an’-by, he takes the spoon he had stirring it, an’ tastes it ‘It is very good now,’ says he, ‘although it wants something yet.’ ‘What is it?’ says they. ‘Oyeh, wisha nothing,’ says he; ‘maybe ’tis only fancy o’ me.’ ‘If it’s anything we can give you,’ says they, ‘you’re welcome to it’ ‘’Tis very good as it is,’ says he; ‘but when I’m at home, I find it gives it a fine flavour just to boil a little knuckle o’ bacon, or mutton trotters, or anything that way along with it.’ ‘Raich hether that bone o’ sheep’s head we had at dinner yesterday, Nell,’ says the man o’ the house. ‘Oyeh, don’t mind it,’ says my father; ‘let it be as it is.’ ‘Sure if it improves it, you may as well,’ says they. ‘Baithershin!’[16] says my father, putting it down. So after boiling it a good piece longer, ‘’Tis as fine limestone broth,’ says he, ‘as ever was tasted; an’ if a man had a few piatez,’ says he, looking at a pot of ’em that was smokin’ in the chimney-corner, ‘he couldn’t desire a better dinner.’ They gave him the piatez, and he made a good dinner of themselves an’ the broth, not forgetting the bone, which he polished equal to chaney before he let it go. The people themselves tasted it, an’ thought it as good as any mutton broth in the world.”
Gerald Griffin (1803–1840).