“He's dead, nabor, an' in throth, an honest man's dead!”
“As ever broke the world's bread. The Lord make his bed in heaven this day! Hasn't he a son larnin' to be a priest in May-newth?”
“Ah! Fahreer gairh! That's all over.”
“Why, is he dead, too?”
“Be Gorra, no—but the conthrairy to that. 'Twas his weddin' you seen passin' a minute agone.”
“Is it the young sogarth's? Musha, bad end to you, man alive, an' spake out. Tell us how that happened. Sowl it's a quare business, an' him was in Maynewth!”
“Faith, he was so; an' they say there wasn't a man in Maynewth able to tache him. But, passin' that over—you see, the father, ould Denis—an' be Gorra, he was very bright, too, till the son grewn up, an' drownded him wid the languidges—the father, you see, ould Denis himself, tuck a faver whin the son was near a year in the college, an' it proved too many for him. He died; an' whin young Dinny hard of it, the divil a one of him would stay any longer in Maynewth. He came home like a scarecrow, said he lost his health in it, an' refused to go back. Faith, it was a lucky thing that his father died beforehand, for it would brake his heart. As it was, they had terrible work about it. But ould Denis is never dead while young Denis is livin'. Faix, he was as stiff as they wor stout, an' wouldn't give in; so, afther ever so much' wranglin', he got the upper hand by tellin' them that he wasn't able to bear the college at all; an' that if he'd go back to it he'd soon folly his father.”
“An' what turned him against the college? Was that thrue?”
“Thrue!—thrue indeed! The same youth was never at a loss for a piece of invintion whin it sarved him. No, the sarra word of thruth at all was in it. He soodered an' palavered a daughther of Owen Connor's, Susy—all the daughther he has, indeed—before he wint to Maynewth at all, they say. She herself wasn't for marryin' him, in regard of a vow she had; but there's no doubt but he made her fond of him, for he has a tongue that 'ud make black white, or white black, for that matther. So, be Gorra, he got the vow taken off of her by the Bishop; she soon recovered her health, for she was dyin' for love of him, an'—you seen their weddin'. It 'ud be worth your while to go a day's journey to get a sight of her—she's allowed to be the purtiest girl that ever was in this part o' the counthry.”
“Well! well! It's a quare world. An' is the family all agreeable to it now?”