hat it is all lies
Croppy has told them; but the ---- governor won't grant me paper. So,
as I am not due to write for nearly three months, I wish you would call
on my mother and my wife, and tell them how things stand."

"I will, you may depend upon that, and I'll get some 'bloke' to give
Croppy a pair of black eyes for his pains, the ---- swine."

"Here comes Pat.--Well, Pat, have you heard that Larry and Tim have
gone to chokey?"

"Yes," replied Pat; "but what screw reported Tim?"

"That leather-skinned cranky old terrier over there reported Tim, and
the 'bloke' with the peg-top whiskers reported Larry."

"Bad 'cess to the 'terrier!' I have a good mind to punch him in the
ear-hole."

"That would fetch a bashing, Pat."

"Troth, and I've had a bashing once afore, and what I've had once I can
do with agin."

"Did you holloa when you were bashed?"

"Holloa! by the piper, I sang out--

'The seeds of repentance, how can they take root,
When I'm ruled by a tyrant and flogged like a brute;
The plant of revenge is more likely to sprout
When such monsters of jailers go strutting about.'

"And I called them all the horrid names I could think on, and they were
wild when they saw I was game."

"Where were you bashed?"

"At Bermuda; and by the piper, they once flogged men before the altar
there, and then called the prisoners into chapel and preached to them
about forgiving one another, and showing mercy to one another, the ----
hypocrites."

"What are you here for this time?"

"Oh, nothing at all. I am like the bloke in the song--

'One day as I passed I looked into the kitchen,
Where I saw a pot boiling, but not for poor Pat;
For love and for thieving I'd always an itchin',
So I took out the mutton and put in the cat.'"

"I understand there was a great many unnatural crimes committed at
Bermuda?"

"Oh! shocking. The young lads would go about with their pockets full of
money, and their hair decked up like girls. It was disgusting, 'pon my
word; and do you know what the authorities called it when cases were
brought before them?"

"No."

"Why, 'malicious gambling.' That was to deceive the public, you know.
There was plenty of 'snout' knocking about in all the prisons in those
days, and a fellow hadn't to go a day without a taste as he has to do
now sometimes. We used to have lots of rum at Bermuda, as well as
'snout,' and first-rate liquor, too. By the piper! I wish I h