Och! that
I was but a jintleman! I'd show them what life is intirely, and
I'd challenge Masther William, and have my revenge out of him
for the blows he gave me."
"You had better mend your trousers," said I, giving him a tailor's
needle, a pair of scissors, and some strong thread.
"Shure, an' I'll do that same in a brace of shakes," and sitting
down upon a ricketty three-legged stool of his own manufacturing,
he commenced his tailoring by tearing off a piece of his trousers
to patch the elbows of his jacket. And this trifling act, simple
as it may appear, was a perfect type of the boy's general conduct,
and marked his progress through life. The present for him was
everything; he had no future. While he supplied stuff from the
trousers to repair the fractures in the jacket, he never reflected
that both would be required on the morrow. Poor John! in his brief
and reckless career, how often have I recalled that foolish act of
his. It now appears to me that his whole life was spent in tearing
his trousers to repair his jacket.
In the evening John asked me for a piece of soap.
"What do you want with soap, John?"
"To wash my shirt, ma'am. Shure an' I'm a baste to be seen, as black
as the pots. Sorra a shirt have I but the one, an' it has stuck on
my back so long that I can thole it no longer."
I looked at the wrists and collar of the condemned garment, which
was all of it that John allowed to be visible. They were much in
need of soap and water.
"Well, John, I will leave you the soap, but can you wash?"
"Och, shure, an' I can thry. If I soap it enough, and rub long
enough, the shirt must come clane at last."
I thought the matter rather doubtful; but when I went to bed I left
what he required, and soon saw through the chinks in the boards a
roaring fire, and heard John whistling over the tub. He whistled and
rubbed, and washed and scrubbed, but as there seemed no end to the
job, and he was a long washing this one garment as Bell would have
been performing the same operation on fifty, I laughed to myself,
and thought of my own abortive attempts in that way, and went fast
asleep. In the morning John came to his breakfast, with his jacket
buttoned up to his throat.
"Could you not dry your shirt by the fire, John? You will get cold
wanting it."
"Aha, by dad! it's dhry enough now. The divil has made tinder of it
long afore this."
"Why, what has happened to it? I heard you washing all night."
"Washing! Faith, an' I did scrub it till my hands were all ruined
intirely, and thin I took the brush to it; but sorra a bit of the
dirth could I get out of it.
