s you _was_ ever the good boy
of a son to me, only I never could make you understand the coorse of
the world's doin's as well as I could wish; but never heed! you'll
improve yet--so take courage and do as I desire you; but mind, if you
don't, never call the Gubbaun Seare your father more, the longest day
you have to live! Do you see that skin?' 'I do, father--I see it,'
says he, innocent as a child. 'Well, Boofun, you must take to the road
now at once, and you must walk on, and never stop till you get some
one that will buy this skin, and pay you for it, and then give you
your skin back again into the bargain.'

"'O! O! father!' says the other, 'I'm a fool myself, I know, and yet
I'm sure I wouldn't do sich a simple thing as _that_,' says he, 'and I
think, indeed, father, you must be a fool _yourself_ to think so,'
says he. 'Howld your tongue, an' be off, you natral!' says the father;
'what do _you_ know about it! Be off at wanst; and here, take this!
here's cost enough for the road,' says he, 'and be sure an' remember
what I towld you,' says he.

"So poor Boofun, sir, wint off; and sorrowful he was to lave his
father, and his business, and his comfortable home, and to go away on
what he thought sich a wild-goose chase. It happened that it was
market-day at the next town, an' many a one overtook him, an' he
cryin'.

"'Well, Boofun,' they'd say, for they knew him, 'are you going to sell
that fine sheep's skin?' 'I am,' he'd say; 'but I know _you_ wont buy
it, for by the way I'm selling it, it would be a dear article for
you.' 'Why so, man? I'm in want of wool, an' very little would make me
buy the same _skin_, for it's fine _wool_.' 'Yes, but,' Boofun would
say, 'you must pay me for it, and then give it me back if you buy it!'
So he would be always laughed at, an' he was nearly dying av dishpair.

"However, on he traveled and walked; and many miles from home he came
to a beautiful lake, all surrounded with trees, very like that lake
where your honor and the captain, and the ladies used to go and fish,
and make peckthers, (pictures,) Inchiquin lake, sir; an' if he did,
there was as darlin' a young lady as could be seen, an' she standing
on the shore of the lake, and after finishing washin' some of the
finest fleeces of iligant wool. 'O!' said he to himself, 'if I could
only get this darlin' to buy _my_ fleece! But no one will ever do so
foolish a thing as that, an' I shall never sell it, nor get back
again!'

"Howe