“'You are a dastardly liar, sir,' responded Hartley. 'You know you had. How can your father and you look each other in the face, when you say so?'
“'Go on,' said Phil, 'you're a fire-eater: so you may say what you like.'
“'Didn't your father, in your name, propose for her upon some former occasion, in the fair of Castle Cumber, and he remembers the answer he got.'
“'Go on,' said Phil, 'you're a fire-eater; that's all I have to say to you.'
“'And now, having ruined her reputation by a base and cowardly plot concocted with a wicked old woman, who would blast the whole family if she could, because M'Loughlin transported her felon son; you, now, like a paltry clown as you are, skulk out of the consequences of your treachery, and refuse to give satisfaction for the diabolical injury you have inflicted on the whole family.'
“'Go on,' said Phil, 'you're a fire-eater.'
“'You forget,' said Val, 'that I am a magistrate, and what the consequences may be to yourself for carrying a hostile message.'
“'Ah,' said Hartley, 'you are a magistrate, and shame on the government that can stoop to the degradation of raising such rascals as you are to become dispensers of justice; it is you and the like of you, that are a curse to the country. As for you, Phil M'Clutchy, I now know, and always suspected, the stuff you are made of. You are a disgrace to the very Orangemen you associate with; for they are, in general, brave fellows, although too often cruel and oppressive when hunted on and stimulated by such as you and your rascally upstart of a father.'
“'Go on,' said Phil, 'you are a fire-eater.'
“'I now leave you both,' continued the young Hotspur, with a blazing eye and flushed cheek, 'with the greatest portion of scorn and contempt which one man can bestow upon another.'