The current of this lecture was never interrupted by a single observation from Ned, who usually employed himself in silently playing with “Bunty;” a little black cur, without a tail, and a great favorite with Nancy; or, if he noticed anything out of its place in the house, he would arrange it with great apparent care. In the meantime, Nancy's wrath generally evaporated with the smoke of the pipe—a circumstance which Ned well knew; for after she had sucked it until it emitted a shrill, bubbling sound, like that from a reed, her brows, which wore at other times an habitual frown, would gradually relax into a more benevolent expression—the parenthetical curves on each side of her mouth, formed by the irascible pursing of her lips, would become less marked—the dog or cat, or whatever else came in her way, instead of being kicked aside, or pursued in an underfit of digressional peevishness, would be put out of her path with gentler force—so that it was, in such circumstances, a matter of little difficulty to perceive that conciliation would soon be the order of the day. Ned's conduct on these critical occasions was very prudent and commendable: he still gave Nancy her own way; never “jawed back to her;” but took shelter, as it were, under his own patience, until the storm had passed, and the sun of her good humor began to shine out again. Nancy herself, now softened by the fumes of her own pigtail, usually made the first overtures to a compromise, but, without departing from the practice and principles of higher negotiators; always in an indirect manner: as, “Biddy, avourneen,” speaking to her niece, “maybe that crathur,” pointing! to Ned, “ate nothing to-day; you had better, agra! get him the could bacon that's in the cupboard, and warm for him, upon the greeshaugh, (* hot embers) them yallow-legs (* a kind of potato) that's in the colindher; though God he knows it's ill my common (* It's ill-becoming—or it ill becomes me, to everlook his conduct)—but no matther, ahagur! There's enough said, I'm thinking—give them to him.”
On Ned seating himself to his bacon and potatoes, Nancy would light another pipe, and plant herself on the opposite hob, putting some interrogatory to him, in the way of business—always concerning a third person, and still in a tone of dry ironical indifference: as—
“Did you see Jimmy Connolly on your travels?”
“No.”
“Humph! Can you tell us if Andy Morrow sould his coult?”
“He did.”
“May be you have gumption enough to know what he got for him?”
“Fifteen guineas.”
“In troth, and it's more nor a poor body would get; but, anyway, Andy Morrow desarves to get a good price; he's a man that takes care of his own business, and minds nothing else. I wish that filly of ours was dockt; you ought to spake to Jim M'Quade about her: it's time to make her up—you know, we'll want to sell her for the rint.”
This was an assertion, by the way, which Ned knew to have everything but truth in it.
“Never heed the filly,” Ned would reply, “I'll get Charley Lawdher (* A blacksmith, and an honest man) to dock her—but it's not her I'm thinking of: did you hear the news about the tobacky?”
“No; but I hope we won't be long go.”
“Well, any how, we wor in luck to buy in them three last rowls.”
“Eh?—in luck? death-alive, how, Ned?”
“Sure there was three ships of it lost last week, on their way from the kingdom of Swuzerland, in the Aist Indians, where it grows: we can rise it thruppence a-pound now.”
“No, Ned! you're not in airnest?”
“Faith, Nancy, you may say I am; and as soon as Tom Loan comes home from Dublin, he'll tell us all about it; and for that matther, maybe it may rise sixpence a-pound; any how we'll gain a lob by it, I'm thinking.”
“May I never stir, but that's luck! Well, Ned, you may thank me for that, any way, or sorra rowl we'd have in the four corners of the house; and you wanted to persuade me against buying them; but I knew betther—for the tobacky's always sure to get a bit of a hitch at this time o' the year.”
“Bedad, you can do it, Nancy: I'll say that for you—that is, and give you your own way.”
“Eh!—can't I, Ned? And, what waa betther, I bate down Pether M'Entee three-ha'pence a-pound afther I bought them.”
“Ha! ha! ha!—by my sannies, Nancy, as to market-making, they may all throw their caps at you, you thief o' the world; you can do them nately!”
“Ha! ha! ha! Stop, Ned; don't drink that water—it's not from the garden-well. I'll jist mix a sup of this last stuff we got from the mountains, till you taste it: I think it's not worse nor the last—for Hugh Traynor's * an ould hand at making it.”
* Hugh, who, by the way, is still living, and, I am glad to
hear, in improved circumstances, was formerly in the habit
of making a drop of the right sort.
This was all Ned wanted: his point was now carried; but with respect to the rising of the tobacco, the less that is said about it the bettor for his veracity.
Having thus given the reader a slight sketch of Ned and Nancy, and of the beautiful valley in which this worthy speculator had his residence, I shall next proceed to introduce him to the village circle, which, during the long winter nights, might be found in front of Ned's kitchen-fire of blazing turf, whose light was given back in ruddy reflection from the bright pewter plates, that were ranged upon the white and well-scoured dresser in just and gradual order, from the small egg-plate to the large and capacious dish, whereon, at Christmas and Easter, the substantial round of corned beef used to rear itself so proudly over the more ignoble joints at the lower end of the table.
Seated in this clear-obscure of domestic light—which, after all, gives the heart a finer and more touching notion of enjoyment than the glitter of the theatre or the blaze of the saloon—might be found first, Andy Morrow,* the juryman of the quarter-sessions, sage and important in the consciousness of legal knowledge, and somewhat dictatorial withal in its application to such knotty points as arose out of the subjects of their nocturnal debates. Secondly, Bob Gott, who filled the foreign and military departments, and related the wonderful history of the ghost which appeared to him on the night after the battle of Bunker's-hill. To him succeeded Tom M'Roarkin, the little asthmatic anecdotarian of half the country—remarkable for chuckling at his own stories. Then came old M'Kinny, poacher and horse-jockey; little, squeaking, thin-faced Alick M'Kinley, a facetious farmer of substance; and Shane Fadh, who handed down, traditions and fairy tales. Enthroned on one hob sat Pat Frayne, the schoolmaster with the short arm, who read and explained the newspaper for “old Square Colwell,” and was looked upon as premier to the aforesaid cabinet; Ned himself filled the opposite seat of honor.
One night, a little before the Christmas holidays in the year 18—, the personages just described were seated around Ned's fire, some with their chirping pints of ale or porter, and others with their quantum of Hugh Traynor, or mountain-dew, and all with good humor, and a strong tendency to happiness, visible in their faces. The night was dark, close, and misty; so dark, indeed, that, as Nancy said, “you could hardly see your finger before you.” Ned himself was full of fun, with a pint of porter beside him, and a pipe in his mouth, just in his glory for the night. Opposite to him was Pat Frayne, with an old newspaper on his knee, which he had just perused for the edification of his audience; beside him was, Nancy, busily employed in knitting a pair of sheep's-grey stockings for Ned; the remaining personages formed a semicircular ring about the hearth. Behind, on the kitchen-table sat Paddy Smith, the servant-man, with three or four of the gorsoons of the village about him, engaged in an under-plot of their own. On the other, a little removed from the light, sat Ned's two nieces, Biddy and Bessy Connolly, former with Atty Johnson's mouth within whisper-reach of her ear, and the latter seated close to her professed admirer, Billy Fulton, her uncle's shopman.* This group; was completely abstracted from the entertainment which was going forward in the circle round the fire.
* Each pair have been since