hedge-schoolmaster and his problems completely into the shade.

The father's pride, on these occasions, always prompted him to become
the aggressor; but he only did this to draw out the talents of his son
to more advantage. Never was man foiled with less regret than old Denis;
nor did ever man more bitterly repent those little touches of vanity,
which, sometimes induced him, when an opportunity of prostrating Denny
arrived, to show what he could have done, by giving the son's argument
an unexpected brainblow. These accidental defeats always brought the
son! more than he lost by them; for the father usually made him a
peace-offering in the shape of pocket-money, books, or clothes. The
great amusement of the peasantry around the chapel-green of a Sunday,
was to hear the father and son engaged in argument; and so simple was
the character of both, that their acquaintances declared, they could
know by the state of young Denis's coat, and the swaggering grasp with
which old Denis held his staff, that an encounter was about to take
place.

"Young O'Shaughnessy's gettin' bare," they would observe; "there'll be
hard arguin' till he gets the clothes. He's puttin' in for a black coat
now, he's so grave. Go on, Denny," they would say again: "more power
an' a dacenter sleeve to your elbow. Stick to him!--very good!--that's
a clincher!--you're gone beyond the skirts, Denny!--let him pocket
that larnin'. Dinis, you're bate, body and slaves! (* altogether;
completely)--you're no match for the gorsoon, Dinis. Good agin,
abouchal!--that's puttin' the collar on it!"--And so on, varying the
phrase according to the whim of the moment.

Nothing gave the father greater pleasure than these observations,
although the affected earnestness with which he encountered the son, and