“That lady behind you appears to have prior claims upon you, Mr. English.”
“Behind me!” he exclaimed, turning about. “Why, Miss Joolia, there's no leddy behind me.”
In the meantime she beckoned to her brother who, while the, proctor was assisting his wife to take her seat, helped up both the girls, who nodding to the Buck, said—
“Thank you, Mr. English: we feel much obliged for your gallant intentions; quite as much, indeed, as if you had carried them into effect.”
This joke, so soon played off after that which had preceded it, and upon the same person, too, occasioned another very general laugh at the Buck's expense; and, beyond a doubt, filled him with a double measure of mortification and resentment.
“There you go,” he muttered, “and it was well said before Mass, that if you set a beggar on horseback he'll ride to the divil.”
“To whom do you apply that language?” asked Alick Purcel.
“To one Michael Purcel, a tithe-proctor, an oppressor and a grinder of the poor,” returned Buck, fiercely.
“And, you insolent scoundrel, how dare you use such language to my father?” said the other. “I tell you, that if it were not from a reluctance to create an unbecoming quarrel so near the house of God, and so soon after his worship, I would horsewhip you, you illiterate, vulgar rascal, where you stand.”
“I would be glad to catch you making the attempt,” replied the Buck, with a look of fury; “because I would give you such a lesson as you would never forget. I would let you know that it isn't your father's unfortunate tenants and day-laborers you have before you—and that you scourge like hounds in a kennel.”