Chapter VIII

But there’s whiles whin the throubles ye’re dhreadin’ seem comin’ be conthrary ways,
An’ ye’ll wondher what road ye should turn from the worst till your mind’s in a maze,
Like me own, whin I heard what the neighbours were sayin’ o’ Nelly. Bedad,
It’s the lasses were jealous I know--but they all would go bail Magrath’s lad
Was just foolin’ the girl for the sake o’ divarsion as certin as fate,
Wid his slootherin’ talk, and his thrapesin’ afther her early an’ late,
Till she’d come to no good. Ay, mayhap, it was nothin’ but envy an’ spite,
Yet it seemed to meself whin the neighbours called Felix a rogue, they said right;
An’ thin Nell’d got no mother to mind her. I couldn’t tell what to be at,
For if all that they talked was the truth, I’d ha’ choked him as soon as a rat;
But the truth was as hard to piece out as a page whin the half of it’s torn;
An’ I’d think ’twixt us both Nell might fare like a little white rose on the thorn,
That two childher’ll be scufflin’ an’ tusslin’ to grab, ’cause it’s purty an’ sweet,
Till its laves is shook off in a shower, an’ throd down in the dust at their feet.