Johnny B. How would I know that?
Paudeen [singing].
Oh, Johnny Gibbons, my five hundred healths to you.
It is long you are away from us over the sea!
Johnny B. [standing up excitedly]. Sure that man could not be John Gibbons that is outlawed.
Paudeen. I asked news of him from the old lad [points after Andrew], and I bringing in the drink along with him. "Don't be asking questions," says he; "take the treat he gives you," says he. "If a lad that had a high heart has a mind to rouse the neighbours," says he, "and to stretch out his hand to all that pass the road, it is in France he learned it," says he, "the place he is but lately come from, and where the wine does be standing open in tubs. Take your treat when you get it," says he, "and make no delay, or all might be discovered and put an end to."
Johnny B. He came over the sea from France! It is Johnny Gibbons surely, but it seems to me they were calling him by some other name.
Paudeen. A man on his keeping might go by a hundred names. Would he be telling it out to us that he never saw before, and we with that clutch of chattering women along with us? Here he is coming now. Wait till you see is he the lad I think him to be.
Martin [coming in]. I will make my banner; I will paint the Unicorn on it. Give me that bit of canvas; there is paint over here. We will get no help from the settled men—we will call to the lawbreakers, the tinkers—the sievemakers—the sheep-stealers. [He begins to make banner.]
Biddy. That sounds to be a queer name of an army. Ribbons I can understand, Whiteboys, Rightboys, Threshers, and Peep-o'-day, but Unicorns I never heard of before.