broke
horse and foot; there's the Slevins that wint to America, an' I lost
more than thirty pounds by them."

"I thought," replied Hacket, "they paid you before they went; they were
always a daicent and an honest family, an' I never heard any one speak
an ill word o' them."

"Not a penny, Harry."

"That's odd, then, bekaise it was only Sunday three weeks, that Murty
Slevin, their cousin, if you remember, made you acknowledge that they
paid you, at the chapel green."

"Ay, an' I do acknowledge; bekaise, Harry, one may as well spake
charitably of the absent as not; it's only in private to you that I'm
lettin' out the truth."

"Well, well," exclaimed the other, rather impatiently, "what have they
to do wid us?"

"Ay, have they; it was what I lost by them an' others--see now, don't
be gettin' onpatient, I bid you--time enough for that when you're
refused--that prevints me from bein' able to give credit as I'd wish.
I'm not refusin' you, Harry; but _achora_, listen; you'll bring your
bill at two months, only I must charge you a trifle for trust, for
chances, or profit an' loss, as the schoolmasther says; but you're to
keep it a saicret from livin' mortal, bekaise if it 'ud get known in
these times that I'd do sich a thing, I'd have the very flesh ait off
o' my bones by others wantin' the same thing; bring me the bill, then,
Harry, an' I'll fill it up myself, only be _dhe husth_ (* hold your
tongue) about it."

Necessity forces those who are distressed to comply with many a
rapacious condition of the kind, and the consequence was that Hacket did
what the pressure of the time compelled him to do, passed his bill to
Skinadre, at a most usurious price, for the food which was so necessary
to his family.

It is surprising how closely the low rustic extortioner and the city
usurer upon a larger scale resemble each other in the expression of
their sentiments, in their habits of business, their plausibility,
natural tact, and especially, in that hardness of heart and utter want
of all human pity and sympathy, upon which the success of their black
arts of usury and extortion essentially depends. With extortion in all
its forms Skinadre, for instance, was familiar. From those who were poor
but honest, he got a bill such as he exacted from Hacket, because he
knew that, cost what it might to them, he was safe in their integrity.
If dishonest, he still got a bill and relied upon the law and its cruel
list of harassing and frau