The older he grew the worse he grew, and by the time he was six years old there was no standing the house for him; he was always making his brothers burn or scald themselves, or break their shins over the pots and stools. One time, in harvest, he was left at home by himself, and when his mother came in she found the cat a-horseback on the dog, with her face to the tail, and her legs tied round him, and the urchin playing his queer tune to them; so that the dog went barking and jumping about, and puss was mewing for the dear life, and slapping her tail backwards and forwards, which, as it would hit against the dog’s chaps, he’d snap it and bite, and then there was the philliloo. Another time, the farmer with whom Mick worked, a very decent, respectable man, happened to call in, and Judy wiped a stool with her apron, and invited him to sit down and rest himself after his walk. He was sitting with his back to the cradle, and behind him was a pan of blood, for Judy was making pig’s puddings. The lad lay quite still in his nest, and watched his opportunity till he got ready a hook at the end of a piece of twine, which he contrived to fling so handily that it caught in the bob of the man’s nice new wig, and soused it in the pan of blood. Another time his mother was coming in from milking the cow, with the pail on her head: the minute he saw her he lilted up his infernal tune and the poor woman, letting go the pail, clapped her hands aside and began to dance a jig, and tumbled the milk all atop of her husband, who was bringing in some turf to boil the supper. In short there would be no end to telling all his pranks, and all the mischievous tricks he played.
Soon after, some mischances began to happen to the farmer’s cattle. A horse took the staggers, a fine veal calf died, and some of his sheep; the cows began to grow vicious, and to kick down the milk pails, and the roof of one end of the barn fell in; and the farmer took it into his head that Mick Flanigan’s unlucky child was the cause of all the mischief. So one day he called Mick aside and said to him: “Mick, you see things are not going on with me as they ought, and to be plain with you, Mick, I think that child of yours is the cause of it. I am really falling away to nothing with fretting, and I can hardly sleep on my bed at night for thinking of what may happen before the morning. So I’d be glad if you’d look out for work somewhere else; you’re as good a man as any in the country, and there’s no fear but you’ll have your choice of work.”
To this Mick replied, that he was sorry for his losses, and still sorrier that he and his should be thought to be the cause of them; that for his own part he was not quite easy in his mind about that child, but he had him and so must keep him. And he promised to look out for another place at once.
So Mick gave out that he was about to leave his work at John Riordan’s, and immediately a farmer who lived a couple of miles off, and who wanted a ploughman (the last one having just left him), came up to Mick, and offered him a house and garden, and work all the year round. Mick, who knew him to be a good employer, immediately closed with him; so it was agreed the farmer should send a car to take his little bit of furniture, and that he should remove on the following Thursday.
When Thursday came, the car came according to promise, and Mick loaded it, and put the cradle with the child and his pipes on the top, and Judy sat beside it to take care of him, lest he should tumble out. They drove the cow before them, the dog followed, but the cat was of course left behind; and the other three children went along the road picking skee-hories (haws) and blackberries, for it was a fine day towards the latter end of harvest.
They had to cross a river, but as it ran through a bottom between two high banks, you did not see it till you were close on it. The young fellow was lying pretty quiet in the bottom of the cradle, till they came to the head of the bridge, when hearing the roaring of the water (for there was a great flood in the river, as it had rained heavily for the last two or three days), he sat up in his cradle and looked about him; and the instant he got a sight of the water and found they were going to take him across it, oh! how he did bellow and how he did squeal!—no rat caught in a snap-trap ever sang out equal to him.
“Whisht! a lanna,” said Judy, “there’s no fear of you; sure it’s only over the stone bridge we’re going.”
“Bad luck to you, you old rip!” cried he, “what a pretty trick you’ve played me, to bring me here!” And still he went on yelling, and the further they got on the bridge the louder he yelled, till at last Mick could hold out no longer, so giving him a skelp with the whip he had in his hand, “You brat!” he said, “will you never stop bawling? A body can’t hear their ears for you.”
The moment he felt the thong of the whip, he leaped up in the cradle, clapped the pipes under his arm, gave a most wicked grin at Mick, and jumped clean off the cart over the side of the bridge down into the water.
“O my child, my child!” shouted Judy, “he’s gone for ever from me.”