"D—n the pistol!" said the squire, throwing it down in a rage. Dick took it up with manifest indignation, and d—d the powder.
"Your powder's damp, Ned."
"No, it's not," said the squire; "it's you who have bungled the loading."
"Me!" said Dick, with a look of mingled rage and astonishment: "I bungle the loading of pistols!—I that have stepped more ground and arranged more affairs than any man in the county!—Arrah, be aisy, Ned!"
Tom Durfy now interfered, and said, for the present it was no matter, as, on the part of his friend, he begged to express himself satisfied.
"But it's very hard we're not to have a shot," said Dick, poking the touch-hole of the pistol with a pricker which he had just taken from the case which Andy was holding before him.
"Why, my dear Dick," said Durfy, "as Murphy has had two shots, and the squire has not had the return of either, he declares he will not fire at him again; and, under these circumstances, I must take my man off the ground."
"Very well," said Dick, still poking the touch-hole, and examining the point of the pricker as he withdrew it.
"And now Murphy wants to know, since the affair is all over and his honour satisfied, what was your brother-in-law's motive in assaulting him this morning, for he himself cannot conceive a cause for it."
"Oh, be aisy, Tom."