foreman, pointing back over his shoulder to the Irish workman, who
was at this moment pretending to be wondrous hard at work. However,
when Mr. Mordicai defied him to tell him any thing he did not know,
Paddy, parting with an untasted bit of tobacco, began and recounted
some of Sir Terence O'Fay's exploits in evading duns, replevying
cattle, fighting sheriffs, bribing _subs_, managing cants, tricking
_custodees_, in language so strange, and with a countenance and
gestures so full of enjoyment of the jest, that, whilst Mordicai
stood for a moment aghast with astonishment, Lord Colambre could
not help laughing, partly at, and partly with, his countryman. All
the yard were in a roar of laughter, though they did not understand
half of what they heard; but their risible muscles were acted upon
mechanically, or maliciously, merely by the sound of the Irish brogue.

Mordicai, waiting till the laugh was over, dryly observed, that "the
law is executed in another guess sort of way in England from what it
is in Ireland;" therefore, for his part, he desired nothing better
than to set his wits fairly against such _sharks_--that there was a
pleasure in doing up a debtor, which none but a creditor could know.

"In a moment, sir; if you'll have a moment's patience, sir, if you
please," said the slow foreman to Lord Colambre; "I must go down the
pounds once more, and then I'll let you have it."

"I'll tell you what, Smithfield," continued Mr. Mordicai, coming close
beside his foreman, and speaking very low, but with a voice trembling
with anger, for he was piqued by his foreman's doubts of his capacity
to cope with Sir Terence O'Fay; "I'll tell you what, Smithfield, I'll
be cursed if I don't get every inch of them into my power--you know
how."