The Fortunes of Hector O'Halloran, and His Man, Mark Antony O'Toole. W. H. Maxwell

There wouldn’t have been a blow, but for the two of them; and the quaker—”

      “The quaker’s not before this court,” said Mr. Bradley, with great dignity: and yet Mr. Bradley told a fib; for the identical Quaker was lying sound asleep upon the guard bed. “What charge do you make, young man?”

      “Why that Mr. French, as you call him, split my ear with a black thorn.”

      “Oh! you villain!” exclaimed the accused. “Now, Peter, the fellow’s on his oath. Peter, I leave it to you. On the nick of your sowl, as an honest man, don’t I always fight with a sapling?”

      “He does, in troth!” responded three charlies in a breath.

      “Now, Peter, what do you say to that? Wouldn’t that make a man’s hair stand an end?”

      “‘Pon my conscience,” observed Mr. Bradley, “I’m thunderstruck—young man, what’s ye’r name?”

      “Sniggs,” said the complainant.

      “What are ye?”

      “A tailor, to trade,” replied the accuser.

      “Then, Sniggs,” returned Mr. Bradley, “the least I can do is to transport ye.”

      “Transport me!” exclaimed the astonished tailor: “Arrah, for what? Is it for having my ear split?”

      “Hold your tongue; I see, though young, ye’r a hardened offender. Have ye no conscience,1 man? Oh, murder! to try and sware away the life of an innicint gintleman!—Is your mother livin’?”

      “No,” replied Mr. Sniggs, not exactly comprehending the drift of Mr. Bradley’s examination.

      “Have you sister, or brother?”

      “Nather,” returned the quondam accuser; but now, as it would appear, by some freak of fortune transmuted into the accused.

      “Have ye no relashins, good nor bad, ye unfortunit divil?”

      “I have,” replied the artist, “a third cousin, a well-behaved girl she is, and greatly respected by her mistress, who’s married to a tanner in the Liberty.”

      “Well,” said Peter graciously, “on account of that well-behaved girl, your third cousin, I’ll show mercy to you this time. Turn him out. Go home and repent, Sniggs: God forgive ye! that’s all I have to say. Be off wid ye.”

      “Arrah, blur and nouns!” ejaculated the disappointed tailor, “and is that all the satisfaction I’m to get for having my ear slit like a swallow’s tail?”

      “Out with him, I say. Wait till I ketch ye here agen, Sniggs. Be this book,” (and Peter flourished the empty pewter-pot) “that well-behaved girl, your third cousin that lives wid the tanner, won’t get you off the second time. I wish the drink was come. I’m grately fatigued givin’ good advice—it always laves me dry as a whistle. But what’s to be done wid the chap in the corner?”

      “There’s no use spakin’ to him now,” returned a watchman; “he’s blind drunk, and fast asleep into the bargain.”

      “Did he do much damage?”

      “Not he,” returned Mr. French; “poor divil! he couldn’t stand, let alone strike. At the commencement of the row he was knocked down like a nine-pin, and I wonder he was not trodden to death. Send him home, Peter ‘pon my life, it’s dangerous to keep him here.”

      “Are ye joking, Artur?”

      “No, honour bright, Peter. Look at his buttons, one of ye. What’s the number of his regiment?”

      “The twenty-first.”

      “Away with him to George’s-street.”

      “Arrah, and upon my conscience, ourselves ought to know the road purty well. God’s blessin’ attind the Kilkinnys! it was a plasure to do bisnis wid them;—four or five to be carried home, reglar, at two shillins a head, and no cobblin’ about the money afterwards. The sergeant of the guard tallied them as they eame in, and it was only to bring the score to the quarter-master, and down came the brads in the mornin’. But who’s to pay for this chap?”

      “I,” said the wild collegian, as he tossed a piece of money to the speaker. “It’s only what one gentleman should do for another, when he’s too drunk to be able to do it for himself. But here comes supper. I wonder what became of the quaker. Ah, Peter! he was a trump—and such a hitter! I’ll respect a quaker while I live. Give me a pull of ‘the heavy,’ and let us have the cockles while they are hot.”

      While Mr. Bradley, with his young and amiable friend, proceeded to discuss their supper, a couple of watchmen lifted the unfortunate quaker off the guard-bed. The movement roused him; but it was soon evident that the late symposium was still uppermost in his brain.

      “Come along,” said the charlie; “step out like a man; we’re bringin’ you home.”

      The remark elicited a drunken effort to be melodious—and Mr Pryme sang, or strove to sing, “We won’t go home till morning.”

      “The divil a here ye’ll stay then,” responded his supporters.

      “Wine—more wine.—‘Wine cures the gout,’” returned the quaker.

      “If it does, sorra touch you’ll have of the disorder for a month of Sundays. Come along wid him.”

      The quaker’s head was still ringing with drunken madrigals, and he proceeded to chaunt “Old King Cole.”

      “Arrah, don’t bother us wid King Cole; but try and put the feet aninder ye. We’ll bring ye to George’s-street.”

      “No,” no muttered the Quaker; “I’ll go home to the Merchants’ Quay.”

      “Divil a sich an umproper place ye’ll go near. Haven’t ye been enough on the ran-tan already the night?” and away they toddled towards the barracks, which destination was safely reached, and the body of the pseudo lieutenant delivered to the guard, with an intimation on the part of the watchmen, that on the morrow particular inquiries should be made touching the general health of the invalid.

      “This must be the officer that joined last week,” said the sergeant. “Go to his room and find his servant; and first put a knapsack under his head, and take his stock off. To do him justice, I never saw a more drunken gentleman.”

      When John Crawford was awakened, and had made a personal inspection, to the utter surprise of the main guard, “pioneers and all,” he repudiated the sleeping gentleman, and satisfactorily illustrated the old adage, that the cowl no more constitutes a monk, than a red jacket makes the soldier. Honest John’s first care was to secure his master’s uniform from further damage, which he contrived to effect by the substitution of a shooting jacket; and then, nemine contradicente, it was agreed, that drunken men should be permitted to sleep themselves sober; and that accordingly, the unhappy puritan should be left in undisturbed repose.

      Morning dawned through the guard-room lattice before Samuel Pryme awoke. If there be a feeling more horrible than another, it is the return of reason to a drunken neophyte when he wakens after his first debauch. The quaker stared wildly round him; there were twenty men in the room—all strangers to him; some sleeping on the wooden bench on which he lay, and others sitting smoking by the fire. His head was giddy—his brain wandered—he was tortured with a burning thirst. Where was he? Suddenly his pale cheeks reddened with shame; he felt like a Hindu who has lost caste; and, burying his face between his hands, in a smothered voice that bespoke a consciousness of abasement, while tears fell fast, he faintly murmured, “Where am I?”

      The sergeant laid aside a book which he had been reading in the window—and, though a rough soldier, he felt sincerely for the penitent.

      “Don’t take on so,” said he. “Young folk will be giddy.