text
stringlengths 0
131
|
|---|
now. Soon they had four poles up and a pole across, right over the |
fire, for all the world like a spit, and on to the pole they slung |
Patrick Rooney. |
"He'll do well enough," said one; "but who's to mind him whilst we're |
away, who'll turn the fire, who'll see that he doesn't burn?" |
With that Patrick opened his lips: "Andrew Coffey," said he. |
"Andrew Coffey! Andrew Coffey! Andrew Coffey! Andrew Coffey!" |
"I'm much obliged to you, gentlemen," said Andrew Coffey, "but indeed I |
know nothing about the business." |
"You'd better come down, Andrew Coffey," said Patrick. |
It was the second time he spoke, and Andrew Coffey decided he would |
come down. The four men went off and he was left all alone with Patrick. |
Then he sat and he kept the fire even, and he kept the spit turning, |
and all the while Patrick looked at him. |
Poor Andrew Coffey couldn't make it all out at all, at all, and he |
stared at Patrick and at the fire, and he thought of the little house |
in the wood, till he felt quite dazed. |
"Ah, but it's burning me ye are!" says Patrick, very short and sharp. |
"I'm sure I beg your pardon," said my grandfather "but might I ask you |
a question?" |
"If you want a crooked answer," said Patrick; "turn away or it'll be |
the worse for you." |
But my grandfather couldn't get it out of his head; hadn't everybody, |
far and near, said Patrick had fallen overboard. There was enough to |
think about, and my grandfather did think. |
"ANDREW COFFEY! ANDREW COFFEY! IT'S BURNING ME YE ARE." |
Sorry enough my grandfather was, and he vowed he wouldn't do so again. |
"You'd better not," said Patrick, and he gave him a cock of his eye, |
and a grin of his teeth, that just sent a shiver down Andrew Coffey's |
back. Well it was odd, that here he should be in a thick wood he had |
never set eyes upon, turning Patrick Rooney upon a spit. You can't |
wonder at my grandfather thinking and thinking and not minding the fire. |
"ANDREW COFFEY, ANDREW COFFEY, IT'S THE DEATH OF YOU I'LL BE." |
And with that what did my grandfather see, but Patrick unslinging |
himself from the spit and his eyes glared and his teeth glistened. |
It was neither stop nor stay my grandfather made, but out he ran into |
the night of the wood. It seemed to him there wasn't a stone but was |
for his stumbling, not a branch but beat his face, not a bramble but |
tore his skin. And wherever it was clear the rain pelted down and the |
cold March wind howled along. |
Glad he was to see a light, and a minute after he was kneeling, dazed, |
drenched, and bedraggled by the hearth side. The brushwood flamed, and |
the brushwood crackled, and soon my grandfather began to feel a little |
warm and dry and easy in his mind. |
"ANDREW COFFEY! ANDREW COFFEY!" |
It's hard for a man to jump when he has been through all my grandfather |
had, but jump he did. And when he looked around, where should he find |
himself but in the very cabin he had first met Patrick in. |
"Andrew Coffey, Andrew Coffey, tell me a story." |
"Is it a story you want?" said my grandfather as bold as may be, for he |
was just tired of being frightened. "Well if you can tell me the rights |
of this one, I'll be thankful." |
And he told the tale of what had befallen him from first to last that |
night. The tale was long, and may be Andrew Coffey was weary. It's |
asleep he must have fallen, for when he awoke he lay on the hill-side |
under the open heavens, and his horse grazed at his side. |
THE BATTLE OF THE BIRDS |
I will tell you a story about the wren. There was once a farmer who was |
seeking a servant, and the wren met him and said: "What are you |
seeking?" |
"I am seeking a servant," said the farmer to the wren. |
"Will you take me?" said the wren. |
"You, you poor creature, what good would you do?" |
"Try me," said the wren. |
So he engaged him, and the first work he set him to do was threshing in |
the barn. The wren threshed (what did he thresh with? Why a flail to be |