Tim mechanically fumbled at his pipes, while the gentlemen busied themselves in procuring partners. There was silence for some seconds. “Begin, piper,” called out our host. “Out ov fashin,” muttered Tim in broken half-finished sentences; “but--I’ll--give--yez--one--as--good----;” and a long, a loud reverberating _snore_ at the instant made good his promise of music almost as harmonious as the sounds elicited from his bagpipe!! Imagine to yourselves, ye who can, the scene that followed. The salts-bottle and perfumed handkerchief of the _exquisites_ were in instant requisition, as if they felt sensations of fainting! the nervous started as if a pistol went off at their heads, and those who bore the explosion with fortitude joined in a chorus of laughter, increased to pain when it was perceived that the Inimitable, noways disturbed or alarmed, prolonged his repose, and agreeably to the laws of music, and in excellent taste, bringing in his _nasal_ performance as a grand _finale_ to each resounding peal! “Now,” observed the friend who had answered for me at a critical crisis, “has not Tim Callaghan made his own panegyric? Has not his merit spoken for itself? What a figure our inimitable piper would have cut, had we ushered him in with a flourish of trumpets!” When the cachinnatory storm had subsided, and when all considered that their unrivalled musician had had enough of slumber, he was once more aroused, to receive his well-earned guerdon, when the following colloquy commenced:-- “Pray, piper, what is your name?” demanded the master of the house, with all the gravity of a magistrate on the bench, and drawing forth his tablets. “E--ah? Why, Tim Callaghan.” “Ha! Tim Callaghan (writing), I shall certainly remember Tim Callaghan! I suppose, Tim, you are quite celebrated?” “E--ah?” “I suppose you are very well known?” “Why, those that knowed me _wanst_, knows me agin,” quoth Tim Callaghan. “I do believe so! I think I shall know you at all events. Who taught you to play the pipes?” “One Tim Hartigan, of the county Clare.” “Had he much trouble in teaching you?” “_He_ thrubble! I knows nothin’ ov _his_ thrubble, but faix I well remimber me own! There is lumps in my head to this very day, from the onmarciful cracks he used to give it when I wint asthray.” “Ha! ha! ha! Oh, poor fellow! Well, farewell, Tim Callaghan!--pleasant be your path through life; and may your fame spread through the thirty-two counties of green Erin, till you die surfeited with glory!” “Faix, I’d rather be _surfeited_ wid a good dinner!” quoth Tim Callaghan, and made his exit.