Page:Comical sayings of Paddy from Cork, with his coat buttoned behind (1).pdf/4

4 Tom. Very well boy, and did you keep it so ?

Teag. Keep it, I would have kept it with all my hear while I lived, death itself could not have parted us, but the old rogue, the gentleman, being a justice of peace himself, had me tried for the rights of it, and how I by it, and so took it again.

Tom. And how did you clear yourself without punish- ment?

Teag. Arra dear shoy, I told him a parcel of lies, bu they would not believe me; for I said that I got it from my father when it was a little pistol, and I had kept iit [sic] till it had grown a gun, and was designed to use it wel until it had grown a a big cannon, and then sell it to the military. They all fell a laughing at me as I had been a fool, and bade me go home to my mother and clear: the potatoes.

Tom. How long is it since you left your own country ?

Teag. Arra, dear honey, I do not mind whether it be a fortnight or four months, but I think myself, it is long time; they tell me my mother is dead since, but wont believe it until I get a letter from her own hand, for she is a very good scholar, suppose she can neither write nor read.

Tom. Was you ever in England before ?

Teag. Ay, that I was, and in Scotland too.

Tom. And were they kind to you when you was in Scotland ?

Teag. They were that kind that they kick’t my arse for me, and the reason was because I would not pay the whole of the liquor that was drunk in the company, though the landlord and his two sons got mouthful about of it all, and I told them it was a trick upon travellers first to drink his liquor, and then to kick him out o doors.

Tom. I really think they have used you badly, be could you not beat them?

Teag. That's what I did, beat them all to their own contentment, but there was one of them stronger than me who would have killed me, if the other two had not pula