“Nay, don’t be denying it, Judy, for I think the
better of ye for it, and shouldn’t be proud to call ye the daughter of a
shister’s son of mine, if I was to hear ye talk ungrateful, and any way
disrespectful of his honour.” “What disrespect,” says she, “to say I’d
rather, if it was my luck, be the wife of another man?” “You’ll have no
luck, mind my words, Judy,” says I; and all I remembered about my poor
master’s goodness in tossing up for her afore he married at all came
across me, and I had a choaking in my throat that hindered me to say
more. “Better luck, any how, Thady,” says she, “than to be like some
folk, following the fortunes of them that have none left.” “Oh! King of
Glory!” says I, “hear the pride and ungratitude of her, and he giving
his last guineas but a minute ago to her childer, and she with the fine
shawl on her he made her a present of but yesterday!” “Oh, troth, Judy,
you’re wrong now,” says my shister, looking at the shawl. “And was not
he wrong yesterday, then,” says she, “to be telling me I was greatly
altered, to affront me?” “But, Judy,” says I, “what is it brings you
here then at all in the mind you are in; is it to make Jason think the
better of you?” “I’ll tell you no more of my secrets, Thady,” says
she, “nor would have told you this much, had I taken you for such an
unnatural fader as I find you are, not to wish your own son prefarred
to another.” “Oh, troth, _you_ are wrong now, Thady,” says my shister.
Well, I was never so put to it in my life: between these womens, and
my son and my master, and all I felt and thought just now, I could not,
upon my conscience, tell which was the wrong from the right. So I said
not a word more, but was only glad his honour had not the luck to hear
all Judy had been saying of him, for I reckoned it would have gone nigh
to break his heart; not that I was of opinion he cared for her as much
as she and my shister fancied, but the ungratitude of the whole from
Judy might not plase him; and he could never stand the notion of not
being well spoken of or beloved like behind his back. Fortunately for
all parties concerned, he was so much elevated at this time, there was
no danger of his understanding any thing, even if it had reached his
ears. There was a great horn at the Lodge, ever since my master and
Captain Moneygawl was in together, that used to belong originally to the
celebrated Sir Patrick, his ancestor; and his honour was fond often of
telling the story that he learned from me when a child, how Sir Patrick
drank the full of this horn without stopping, and this was what no
other man afore or since could without drawing breath. Now Sir Condy
challenged the gauger, who seemed to think little of the horn, to
swallow the contents, and had it filled to the brim with punch; and the
gauger said it was what he could not do for nothing, but he’d hold Sir
Condy a hundred guineas he’d do it. “Done,” says my master; “I’ll lay
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