s, African buffoons, or any other uncivilized animals.
It was one of them, he that's married to my own fourth cousin, Biddy
O'Callaghan, that knocked two of my grinders out, for which piece of
civility I had the satisfaction of breaking a splinter or two in his
carcase, being always honestly disposed to pay my debts.

"With respect to the O'Hallaghans, they and our family, have been next
neighbors since before the Flood--and that's as good as two hundred
years; for I believe it's 198, any how, since my great grandfather's
grand-uncle's ould mare was swept out of the 'Island,' in the dead of
the night, about half an hour after the whole country had been ris out
of their beds by the thunder and lightning. Many a field of oats and
many a life, both of beast and Christian, was lost in it, especially of
those that lived on the bottoms about the edge of the river: and it was
true for them that said it came before something; for the next year was
one 'of the hottest summers ever remembered in Ireland.

"These O'Hallaghans couldn't be at peace with a saint. Before they
and our faction, began to quarrel, it's said that the O'Donnells,
or Donnells, and they had been at it,--and a blackguard set the same
O'Donnells were, at all times--in fair and market, dance, wake, and
berrin, setting the country on fire. Whenever they met, it was heads
cracked and bones broken; till by degrees the O'Donnells fell away, one
after another, from fighting, accidents, and hanging; so that at last
there was hardly the name of one of them in the neighborhood. The
O'Hallaghans, after this, had the country under themselves--were the
cocks of the walk entirely;--who but they? A man darn't look crooked at
them, or he was certain of getting his head in his fist. And when they'd
get drunk in a fair, it was nothing but 'Whoo! for the O'Hallaghans!'
and leaping yards high off the pavement, brandishing their cudgels over
their heads, striking their heels against their hams, tossing up their
hats; and when all would fail, they'd strip off their coats, and trail
them up and down the street, shouting, 'Who dare touch the coat of an
O'Hallaghan? Where's the blackguard Donnells now?'--and so on, till
flesh and blood couldn't stand it.

"In the course of time, the whole country was turned against them; for
no crowd could get together in which they didn't kick up a row, nor a
bit of stray fighting couldn't be, but they'd pick it up first; and if a
man would venture