The Merry Past 



" you won't pass my door widout tasting a dhrop, 

 just for look, Captain ? " " I'm obliged to ye all 

 the same as if I drank," replied the punctilious 

 squire ; " and I'd do that same with all my heart, 

 Barney dear " — at the same time putting his mare into 

 a walk — " only I'm in dread my mother would find 

 the smell of spirits on me at breakfast ! " 



" There is one thing I had clane forgot to till yez," 

 said an old Irish squire to his son on his death-bed, 

 after he had given him sundry good advices ; " and 

 'tis will it came into the hid av me, or I cudn't have 

 died aisy. Mind whin yu are out dining, in the 

 winter time ispicially, always to come clane an sober 

 off after the tinth tum'ler of punch ; an' that's the 

 way yule's nat be breaking yure nick by rason of 

 tum'lin' in ditches like a dhrunken blackguard ; now 

 mind that, jewel, an' my blissin' be wid yu ! " 



A typical old Irish squire — it was said — the last 

 of his kind — " a raal ould crack o' the whip," as he 

 was familiarly termed by the peasantry of his im- 

 mediate vicinity — was a certain veteran sportsman 

 of seventy, who lived in Munster at the commence- 

 ment of the nineteenth century. 



This gentleman had received a rather rough educa- 

 tion, but had in some degree been polished by a 

 short residence abroad, had thence gone early into 

 the army, where he had fought (according to the 

 usage of the times), and killed not only his man, but 

 nearly three at once, as he used to narrate with some- 

 thing of eccentric emphasis and whimsical melancholy. 

 He had then run away with the girl of his choice 



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