“The heavens mark you to grace, Dinny. You did that in brave style. Phadrick, ahagur, he'll make the darlin' of an arguer whin he gets the robes an him.”
“I don't deny that; he'll be aquil to the best o' thim: still, Denis, I'd rather, whin I want to pronounce upon colors, that he'd let me keep my eyes open.”
“Ay, but he did it out o' the books, man alive; an' there's no goin' beyant thim. Sure he could prove it out of the Divinity, if you went to that. An' what is still more, he could, by shuttin' your eyes, in the same way prove black to be white, an' white black, jist as asy.”
“Surely myself doesn't doubt it. I suppose, by shuttin' my eyes, the same lad could prove anything to me.”
“But, Dinny, avourneen, you didn't prove Phadrick to be an ass yit. Will you do that by histhory, too, Dinny, or by the norrations of Illocution?”
“Father, I'm surprised at your gross imperception. Why, man, if you were not a rara avis of somnolency, a man of most frolicsome determinations, you'd be able to see that I've proved Phadrick to be an ass already.”
“Throth, I deny that you did; there wasn't a word about my bein' an ass, in the last discoorse. It was all upon the differ atween black an' white.”
“Oh, how I scorn your gravity, man! Ignorantia, as I said, is your date an' superscription; an' when you die, you ought to go an' engage a stone-cutter to carve you a headstone, an' make him write on it, Hic jacet Ignorantius Redivicus. An' the translation of that is, accordin' to Publius Virgilius Maro—'here lies a quadruped who didn't know the differ atween black an' white.'”
“Well, by the livin', Dinny, I dunna where you get all this deep readin'.”
“Sure he gets it all in the Dixonary.”