Book contents
- Frontmatter
- CONTENTS
- Acknowledgements
- List of Figures
- Introduction
- Select Bibliography
- Note on the Text
- Note on the Illustrations
- Sketches of Irish Character
- Dedication
- INTRODUCTION
- CONTENTS, AND LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
- 1 LILLY O'BRIEN
- 2 MARY RYAN's DAUGHTER
- 3 THE BANNOW POSTMAN
- 4 “WE'LL SEE ABOUT IT.”
- 5 THE LAST OF THE LINE
- 6 THE WOOING AND WEDDING
- 7 JACK THE SHRIMP
- 8 HOSPITALITY
- 9 “TAKE IT EASY.”
- 10 PETER THE PROPHET
- 11 KATE CONNOR
- 12 FATHER MIKE
- 13 LARRY MOORE
- KELLY THE PIPER
- THE RAPPAREE
- ANNIE LESLIE
- MASTER BEN
- THE WISE THOUGHT
- MABEL O'NEIL'S CURSE
- THE FAIRY OF FORTH
- MARY MACGOHARTY'S PETITION
- OLD FRANK
- LUKE O'BRIAN
- INDEPENDENCE
- BLACK DENNIS
- GERALDINE
- CAPTAIN ANDY
- GOOD SPIRITS AND BAD
- Editorial Notes
- Silent Corrections
- Textual Variants
10 - PETER THE PROPHET
- Frontmatter
- CONTENTS
- Acknowledgements
- List of Figures
- Introduction
- Select Bibliography
- Note on the Text
- Note on the Illustrations
- Sketches of Irish Character
- Dedication
- INTRODUCTION
- CONTENTS, AND LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
- 1 LILLY O'BRIEN
- 2 MARY RYAN's DAUGHTER
- 3 THE BANNOW POSTMAN
- 4 “WE'LL SEE ABOUT IT.”
- 5 THE LAST OF THE LINE
- 6 THE WOOING AND WEDDING
- 7 JACK THE SHRIMP
- 8 HOSPITALITY
- 9 “TAKE IT EASY.”
- 10 PETER THE PROPHET
- 11 KATE CONNOR
- 12 FATHER MIKE
- 13 LARRY MOORE
- KELLY THE PIPER
- THE RAPPAREE
- ANNIE LESLIE
- MASTER BEN
- THE WISE THOUGHT
- MABEL O'NEIL'S CURSE
- THE FAIRY OF FORTH
- MARY MACGOHARTY'S PETITION
- OLD FRANK
- LUKE O'BRIAN
- INDEPENDENCE
- BLACK DENNIS
- GERALDINE
- CAPTAIN ANDY
- GOOD SPIRITS AND BAD
- Editorial Notes
- Silent Corrections
- Textual Variants
Summary
“Don't talk to me, Paddy Mulvany – don't talk to me! – where's the use of your talking, chitter-chatter, chitter-chatter, like a nest of magpies? Don't I know what I know? – Improvements, indeed! – answer me this: am not I fifty-two years and three months old – and having a fine memory, as well as much foresight – thanks be to God for the same – don't I recollect as good as fifty years? And what then? Why this; that all the trading-boats landed, on that out shore, safe and sound, whatever was wanted. – Don't tell me of the place being inconvanient, Paddy Mulvany: it's no such thing. In a peaceable village, building a quay to land coal! As if the people can't burn turf as their grandfathers did afore them! And timber! – won't wattles do for the cabins as well as ever? But mark the upshot of this – every potato, every grain of corn, 'll be bought up, and sent out of the country, when the English boats come in, and we shall all be starved; and neither man, woman, nor child, will be left alive to tell the story.”
“Why, thin, Mister Peter, sure it's yerself that sees the sunny side of a thing; ye've a mighty cheering way wid ye, ever and always,” said Paddy Mulvany, looking archly at his companion.
Sunny side! – Why, there's no sunny side, man alive, to see. When Wellington Bridge was built over the Scar, and sure they were talking of that bridge more than a hundred years before it was begun; – no good will come of it, says I, and I was right; it has now been built three years, and no road made to it yet; and, by the same token, it's cracked in the middle; I knew no good would come of it. Oh, what sarvice that money would have done the neighbours, if it had been properly laid out!”
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- Sketches of Irish Characterby Mrs S C Hall, pp. 169 - 182Publisher: Pickering & ChattoFirst published in: 2014