een a gr-reat blessin' to me. But amidst all these
granjoors here am I th' same ol' antiquated combination iv bellows
an' pump I always was. Not so good. Time has worn me out. Th'
years like little boys with jackknives has carved their names in
me top. Ivry day I have to write off something f'r deprecyation.
'Tis about time f'r whoiver owns me to wurruk me off on a thrust.
Mechanical science has done ivrything f'r me but help me. I suppose
I ought to feel supeeryor to me father. He niver see a high buildin'
but he didn't want to. He cudden't come here in five days but he
was a wise man an' if he cud've come in three he'd have stayed
in th' County Roscommon.

"Th' pa-apers tells me that midical science has kept pace with
th' hop-skip-an'-a-jump iv mechanical inginooty. Th' doctors has
found th' mickrobe iv ivrything fr'm lumbago to love an' fr'm
jandice to jealousy, but if a brick bounces on me head I'm crated
up th' same as iv yore an' put away. Rockyfellar can make a pianny
out iv a bar'l iv crude ile, but no wan has been able to make a
blade iv hair grow on Rockyfellar. They was a doctor over in
France that discovered a kind iv a thing that if 'twas pumped into
ye wud make ye live till people got so tired iv seein' ye around
they cud scream. He died th' nex' year iv premachure ol' age.
They was another doctor cud insure whether th' flex' wan wud be a
boy or a girl. All ye had to do was to decide wud it be Arthur
or Ethel an' lave him know. He left a fam'ly iv unmarredgeable
daughters.

"I sometimes wondher whether pro-gress is anny more thin a kind
iv a shift. It's like a merry-go-round. We get up on a speckled
wooden horse an' th' mechanical pianny plays a chune an' away we
go, hollerin'. We think we're thravellin' like th' divvle but th'
man that doesn't care about merry-go-rounds knows that we will
come back where we were. We get out dizzy an' sick an' lay on th'
grass an' gasp: 'Where am I? Is this th' meelin-yum?' An' he says:
'No, 'tis Ar-rchey Road.' Father Kelly says th' Agyptians done
things we cudden't do an' th' Romans put up sky-scrapers an' aven
th' Chinks had tillyphones an' phony-grafts.

"I've been up to th' top iv th' very highest buildin' in town,
Hinnissy, an' I wasn't anny nearer Hivin thin if I was in th'
sthreet. Th' stars was as far away as iver. An' down beneath is
a lot iv us runnin' an' lapin' an' jumpin' about, pushin' each other
over, haulin' little sthrips iv ir'n