The monstrous pain of this proceeding Had not so numbed his miser wit, But in this slip he saw a hit To save, at least, his purse from bleeding; So when the dentist sought his fees, Quoth Hunks, “Let’s finish, if you please.” “How, finish! why it’s out!”--“Oh! no-- I’m none of your before-hand tippers, ’Tis you are out, to argue so; My tooth is in my head no doubt, But as you say you pulled it out, Of course it’s there--between your nippers.” “Zounds! sir, d’ye think I’d sell the truth To get a fee? no, wretch, I scorn it.” But Hunks still asked to see the tooth, And swore by gum! he had not drawn it. His end obtained, he took his leave, A secret chuckle in his sleeve; The joke was worthy to produce one, To think, by favour of his wit, How well a dentist had been bit By one old stump, and that a loose one! The thing was worth a laugh, but mirth Is still the frailest thing on earth: Alas! how often when a joke Seems in our sleeve, and safe enough, There comes some unexpected stroke, And hangs a weeper on the cuff! Hunks had not whistled half a mile, When, planted right against the stile, There stood his foeman, Mike Maloney, A vagrant reaper, Irish-born, That helped to reap our miser’s corn, But had not helped to reap his money, A fact that Hunks remembered quickly; His whistle all at once was quelled, And when he saw how Michael held His sickle, he felt rather sickly. Nine souls in ten, with half his fright, Would soon have paid the bill at sight, But misers (let observers watch it) Will never part with their delight Till well demanded by a hatchet-- They live hard--and they die to match it. Thus Hunks, prepared for Mike’s attacking, Resolved not yet to pay the debt, But let him take it out in hacking; However, Mike began to stickle In word before he used the sickle; But mercy was not long attendant: From words at last he took to blows, And aimed a cut at Hunks’s nose; That made it what some folks are not-- A Member very independent.