was natural for you to suppose, after seeing that dinner of pork,
and hearing that song, that we had been drabbing baulor; I will now
tell you that we have not been doing so. What have you to say to
that?"

"That I am very glad of it."

"Had you tasted that pork, brother, you would have found that it
was sweet and tasty, which balluva that is drabbed can hardly be
expected to be. We have no reason to drab baulor at present, we
have money and credit; but necessity has no law. Our forefathers
occasionally drabbed baulor; some of our people may still do such a
thing, but only from compulsion."

"I see," said I; "and at your merry meetings you sing songs upon
the compulsatory deeds of your people, alias, their villainous
actions; and, after all, what would the stirring poetry of any
nation be, but for its compulsatory deeds? Look at the poetry of
Scotland, the heroic part, founded almost entirely on the
villainous deeds of the Scotch nation; cow-stealing, for example,
which is very little better than drabbing baulor; whilst the softer
part is mostly about the slips of its females among the broom, so
that no upholder of Scotch poetry could censure Ursula's song as
indelicate, even if he understood it. What do you think, Jasper?"

"I think, brother, as I before said, that occasionally you utter a
word of common sense; you were talking of the Scotch, brother; what
do you think of a Scotchman finding fault with Romany!"

"A Scotchman finding fault with Romany, Jasper! Oh dear, but you