John.  He wishes much to have one more encounter with the fellow; he says that on fair ground, and in fine weather, he has no doubt that he could master him, and hand him over to the quarter sessions.  He says that a hundred pounds would be no bad thing to be disbanded upon; for he wishes to take an inn at Swanton Morley, keep a cock-pit, and live respectably.

Myself.  He is quite right; and now kiss me, my darling brother, for I must go back through the bog to Templemore.

* * * * *

‘Is it a long time since you have seen any of these Gwyddeliaid [Irish]?’

‘About two months, sir, and then a terrible fright they caused me.’

‘How was that?’

’I will tell you, sir; I had been across the Berwyn to carry home a piece of weaving work to a person who employs me.  It was night as I returned, and when I was about halfway down the hill, at a place which is called Allt Paddy, because the Gwyddelod are in the habit of taking up their quarters there, I came upon a gang of them, who had come there and camped and lighted their fire whilst I was on the other side of the hill.  There were nearly twenty of them, men and women, and amongst the rest was a man standing naked in a tub of water with two women stroking him down with clouts.  He was a large fierce-looking fellow and his body, on which the flame of the fire glittered, was nearly covered with red hair.  I never saw such a sight.  As I passed they glared at me and talked violently in their Paddy Gwyddel, but did not offer to molest me.  I hastened down the hill, and right glad I was when I found myself safe and sound at my house in Llangollen, with my money in my pocket, for I had several shillings there, which the man across the hill had paid me for the work which I had done.’

* * * * *

Now, a tinker is his own master, a scholar is not.  Let us suppose the best of scholars, a schoolmaster, for example, for I suppose you will admit that no one can be higher in scholarship than a schoolmaster; do you call his a pleasant life?  I don’t; we should call him a school-slave, rather than a schoolmaster.  Only conceive him in blessed weather like this, in his close school, teaching children to write in copy-books, ‘Evil communication corrupts good manners.’ . . .  Only conceive him, I say, drudging in such guise from morning till night, without any rational enjoyment but to beat the children.  Would you compare such a dog’s life as that with your own—­the happiest under heaven—­true Eden life, as the Germans would say,—­pitching your tent under the pleasant hedgerow, listening to the song of the feathered tribes, collecting all the leaky kettles in the neighbourhood, soldering and joining, earning your honest bread by the wholesome sweat of your brow—­making ten holes—­hey, what’s this? what’s the man crying for?

* * * * *

‘Did you speak, Don Jorge?’ demanded the archbishop.