Oh! bedad, I'll
have no refusin'; a purty woman always makes a foo----"
"Keep away, Phelim; keep off; bad end to you; what do you mane? Don't
you see Fool Art lyin' in the corner there undher the sacks? I don't
think he's asleep."
"Fool Art! why, the misfortunate idiot, what about him? Sure he hasn't
sinse to know the right hand from the left. Bedad, ma'am the truth is,
that a purty woman always makes a----"
"Throth an' you won't," said she struggling.
"Throth an' I will, thin, taste the same lips, or we'll see whose
strongest!"
A good-humored struggle took place between the housekeeper and Phelim,
who found her, in point of personal strength, very near a match for him.
She laughed heartily, but Phelim attempted to salute her with a face
of mock gravity as nearly resembling that of a serious man as he could
assume. In the meantime, chairs were overturned, and wooden dishes
trundled about; a crash was heard here, and another there. Phelim drove
her to the hob, and from the hob they both bounced into the fire, the
embers and ashes of which were kicked up into a cloud about them.
"Phelim, spare your strinth," said the funny housekeeper, "it won't do.
Be asy now, or I'll get angry. The priest, too, will hear the noise, and
so will Fool Art."
"To the divil wid Fool Art an' the priest, too," said Phelim, "who cares
abuckey about the priest when a purty woman like you is consarn--
"What's this?" said the priest, stepping down from the parlor--"What's
the matter? Oh, ho, upon my word, Mrs.
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