"With all my heart," said Mr. Daly, breaking the top off his third egg
--"with all my heart; I'd rather you'd talk it than me. Much conversation
in that tongue, I'm thinking, would be mighty apt to loosen one's teeth."

"Not at all, it is the most beautiful language in Europe, and the most
musical too. Why, even for your own peculiar taste in such matters,
where can you find any language so rich in Bacchanalian songs as German?"

"I'd rather hear the "Cruiskeen Lawn" or the "Jug of Punch" as my old
friend Pat. Samson could sing them, than a score of your high Dutch
jawbreakers."

"Shame upon ye, Mr. Daly; and for pathos, for true feeling, where is
there anything equal to Schiller's ballads?"

"I don't think I've ever heard any of his; but if you will talk of
ballads," said the Counsellor, "give me old Mosey M'Garry's: what's finer
than"--and here began, with a most nasal twang and dolorous emphasis, to
sing--

"'And I stepp'd up unto her,
An' I made a congee--
And I ax'd her, her pardon
For the making so free.'

"And then the next verse, she says--

"'Are you goin' to undo me,
In this desert alone?'--