"Well, ma'm," said he, "what do you mean by disturbin' me in this unprincipled way?"
"Indeed, sir," replied Peggy, timidly, "an' I'm a'most ashamed to tell you; it's that man o' mine over the way, sir; sure, I don't know what's come to him, at all, at all, within the last few hours."
"Ho! ho!" thought Dan, he's had a quare time of it as well as myself. "What's the matter with him, Mrs. Duffy?"
"That's what I want to know, sir, av anybody'd only tell me; I never knew him to kick up such tanthrums ever since we come together; musha! sure, an' the devil's in him if ever he enthered a mortal body, this blessed day--an' _dhrink!_ murdher alive, sir, av he wouldn't dhrink the _say_ dhry av he only had the swally, I'm not here."
"That's bad, very bad, indeed," said the other, oracularly. "People should never indulge in such terrible propensities," he went on, with a bold attempt at Bulworthy's phraseology.
"Sure, sir, doesn't it depend upon what dhrives them to it?" replied Peggy. "Throuble's mighty dhrouthy, sir, intirely; it dhrys up a poor man's throat as if there was a fire in his mouth, and, indeed, me poor Dan's poorer nor the poorest this holy day."
"That's no rayson, ma'm," said the other, with mock sternness, although his frame was in a glow of joy at hearing how Peggy managed to find excuses for his favorite failing. "That's no rayson, ma'm; the more fool him for addin' flame to the fire."
"Thrue for you, sir, but then doesn't it dhrownd the blaze for the time?"
"I'll answer ye that, Mrs. Duff, if you please, allygorically; did ye ever see a few dhrops of sperrets flung into a blazin' fire? a murdherin' lot of dhrowndin' there is about it; bedad, the fire only burns with greater strength."
"Then, of coorse, your honor, it stands to good sense that it's foolish to take _only_ a few dhrops," she replied, with a sly look at the Squire, that made the laugh bubble all over his ruddy face.
"One would a'most suppose that you loved this Dan of yours," said he.
"Love him, sir! do the spring flowers love the sun? does the young mother love her new-born babby?"
"Oh! murdher, murdher! listen to this," cried Dan; "an' me shut up inside of this prison of a carcass; it was a mortial sin to leave her, an' I'm sufferin' for it as I ought, an' it sarves me right." The thought made him savage, so turning to poor Peggy with a look of anger, he continued, fiercely: