Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor, Volume II
General
Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor, Volume II
American wit and humor
Och! don't be talkin'. Is it howld on, ye say? An' didn't I howld on
till the heart of me was clane broke entirely, and me wastin' that thin
you could clutch me wid yer two hands! To think o' me toilin' like a
nager for the six year I've been in Ameriky--bad luck to the day I iver
left the owld counthry, to be bate by the likes o' them! (faix, an'
I'll sit down when I'm ready, so I will, Ann Ryan, an' ye'd better be
list'nin' than drawin' your remarks), an' it's mysel', with five good
characters from respectable places, would be herdin' wid the haythens.
The saints forgive me, but I'd be buried alive soon 'n put up wid a day
longer. Sure, an' I was a granehorn not to be lavin' at onct when the
missus kim into me kitchen wid her perlaver about the new waiter-man
which was brought out from Californy.
"He'll be here the night," says she, "and Kitty, it's meself looks to
you to be kind and patient wid him, for he's a furriner," says she, a
kind o' looking off. "Sure an' it's little I'll hinder nor interfare
wid him nor any other, mum," says I, a kind o' stiff, for I minded
me how these French waiters, wid their paper collars and brass rings
on their fingers, isn't company for no gurril brought up dacint and
honest. Och! sorra a bit I knew what was comin' till the missus walked
into me kitchen smilin', and says, kind o' schared, "Here's Fing Wing,
Kitty, an' you'll have too much sinse to mind his bein' a little
strange." Wid that she shoots the doore; and I, misthrusting if I was
tidied up sufficient for me fine buy wid his paper collar, looks up
and----Holy fathers! may I never brathe another breath, but there stud
a rale haythen Chineser a-grinnin' like he'd just come off a tay-box.
If you'll belave me, the crayture was that yeller it 'ud sicken you
to see him; and sorra stich was on him but a black night-gown over
his trousers, and the front of 'is head shaved claner nor a copper
biler, and a black tail a-hanging down from behind, wid his two feet
stook into the heathenesest shoes you ever set eyes on. Och! but I was
upstairs afore you could turn about, a-givin' the missus-warnin'; an'
only stopt wid her by her raisin' me wages two dollars and playdin'
wid me how it was a Christian's duty to bear wid haythins and taitch
'em all in our power--the saints save us! Well, the ways and trials I
had wid that Chineser, Ann Ryan, I couldn't be tellin'. Not a blissed
thing cud I do but he'd be lookin' on wid his eyes cocked up'ard like
two poomp-handles, an' he widdout a speck or a smitch o' whiskers on
him, and his finger-nails full a yard long. But it's dying you'd be to
see the missus a-larnin' him, and he grinnin' an' waggin' his pig-tail
(which was pieced out long wid some black stoof, the haythen chate!),
and gettin' into her ways wonderful quick, I don't deny, imitatin' that
sharp, you'd be shurprised, and ketchin' and copyin' things the best of
us will do a-hurried wid work yet don't want comin' to the knowledge of
the family--bad luck to him!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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