Page:The Naval Officer (1829), vol. 1.djvu/53

 have been the subject of a coroner's inquest had not the waiter and chambermaid ran in to my rescue. The tongue of the latter was particularly active in my favour: unluckily for me, she had no other weapon near her, or it would have gone hard with Murphy. "Shame!" said she, "for such a great lubberly creature to beat such a poor, little, innocent, defenceless fellow as that. What would his mamma say to see him treated so?"

"D—n his mamma, and you too," said Pat, "look at my eye."

"D—n your eye," said the waiter; "it's a pity he had not served the other one the same way; no more than you deserve for striking a child; the boy is game, and that's more than you are; he is worth as many of you, as will stand between this and the iron chair at Barbican."

"I'd like to see him ducked in it," said the maid.

While this was going on, I had resumed my