than they seemed taken
all aback; but the rector, suddenly starting up with the cards in his
hand, asked me what I did there, threatening to have me well disciplined
if I did not go about my business; 'I am come for my pack,' said I, 'ye
ould thaif, and to tell his Holiness how I have been treated by ye;' then
going down on my knees before his Holiness, I said, 'Arrah, now, your
Holiness! will ye not see justice done to a poor boy who has been sadly
misused? The pack of cards which that old ruffian has in his hand are my
cards, which he has taken from me, in order to chate with. Arrah! don't
play with him, your Holiness, for he'll only chate ye--there are dirty
marks upon the cards which bear the trumps, put there in order to know
them by; and the ould thaif in daling out will give himself all the good
cards, and chate ye of the last farthing in your pocket; so let them be
taken from him, your Holiness, and given back to me; and order him to
lave the room, and then, if your Holiness be for an honest game, don't
think I am the boy to baulk ye. I'll take the old ruffian's place, and
play with ye till evening, and all night besides, and divil an advantage
will I take of the dirty marks, though I know them all, having placed
them on the cards myself.' I was going on in this way when the ould
thaif of a rector, flinging down the cards, made at me as if to kick me
out of the room, whereupon I started up and said, 'If ye are for kicking,
sure two can play at that;' and then I kicked at his reverence, and his
reverence at me, and there was a regular scrimmage between us, which
frightened the Pope, who, getting up, said some words which I did not
understand, but which the cook afterwards told me were, 'English
extravagance, and this is the second edition;' for it seems that, a
little time before, his Holiness had been frightened in St. Peter's
Church by the servant of an English family, which those thaives of the
English religious house had been endeavouring to bring over to the
Catholic faith, and who didn't approve of their being converted. Och!
his Holiness did us all sore injustice to call us English, and to
confound our house with the other; for however dirty our house might be,
our house was a clane house compared with the English house, and we
honest people compared with those English thaives. Well, his Holiness
was frighted, and the almoner ran out, and brought in his Holiness's
attendants, and they laid hold of me,