DEVLIN
‘Tis a fine mornin’.

FALVEY
A glorious mornin’, thank God.

DEVLIN
Is that your breakfast that you’re eatin’?

FALVEY
Indeed it is, stranger, and maybe my dinner and
supper too.

DEVLIN
’Tis the hell of a thing to be poor.

FALVEY
Sure ’tis myself that knows it.

DEVLIN
And ’tis as bad to be rich and not to be able to get
any of your money like myself.

FALVEY
There’s trouble in everythin’, but no respect for the
poor.

DEVLIN None whatever! none whatever!  And no greater misfortune could befall a man than to be poor and honest at the same time.  But all the same I’ll be a millionaire when my money comes from America.

FALVEY
America must be a great country.  One man is as
good as another there, I believe.

DEVLIN So they say, when both of them have nothin’. (Looking hard at the stranger) Tell me, haven’t I seen you somewhere before?  What’s that your name is?

FALVEY
My name is Bernard Falvey, and I come from Ballinore.

DEVLIN Well, well, to be sure, and I’m Garret Devlin, your mother’s first cousin!  Who’d ever think of meetin’ you here.  The world is a small place after all!

FALVEY
It must be fifteen or more years since last we met.

DEVLIN
Every day of it.  And what have you been doing
since?  I’d hardly know you at all, the way you have
changed.

FALVEY
Workin’ when I wasn’t idle and idle when I wasn’t
workin’, but in trouble all the time.

DEVLIN You’re like myself.  I too only exchange one kind of trouble for another.  When I got married I had to live with the wife’s mother for two years, and when she died, I had to support my widowed sister-in-law’s three children.  And when they were rared and fit to be earnin’ for themselves and be a help to me, they got drowned.  Then my poor wife lost her senses, and I haven’t had peace or ease ever since.  She thinks that she is the Queen of England, and that I’m the King.

FAVLEY
An’ have you no children?

DEVLIN
One boy.

FALVEY
An’ what does he do for a livin’?

DEVLIN
He’s a private in the militia, and his mother thinks
he’s the Prince of Wales.

FALVEY
God help us all, but ’tis the queer things that happen
to the poor.

DEVLIN
An’ what are you doin’ in these parts?

FALVEY
Lookin’ for work.

DEVLIN An’ that itself is the worst kind of hardship.  I don’t think that there’s much doin’ these times for the natives, not to mention the strangers, though ’tis the strangers get the pickings wherever they go.  We’ll have a look at the newspaper and see what’s doin’ anyway. (Reads from the advertisement columns) “Wanted a respectable man, to act as a coachman to His Lordship the Bishop.  He must have a good appearance, have sober habits, and a knowledge of horses and the ways of the clergy.”  That won’t do.