in opposition to you, set up a public;—you do not like Goody Solomons, Peter Dealtry?"
"If that were all Jacobina had done!" said the landlord, grinning.
"All! what else did she do? Why she eat up John Tomkins's canary-bird; and did not John Tomkins, saucy rascal, say you could not sing better nor a raven?"
"I have nothing to say against the poor creature for that," said Peter, stroking the cat of his own accord. "Cats will eat birds, 'tis the 'spensation of Providence. But what! Corporal!" and Peter hastily withdrawing his hand, hurried it into his breeches pocket—"but what! did not she scratch Joe Webster's little boy's hand into ribbons, because the boy tried to prevent her running off with a ball of string?"
"And well," grunted the Corporal, "that was not Jacobina's doing, that was my doing. I wanted the string—offered to pay a penny for it—think of that!"
"It was priced three pence ha'penny," said Peter.
"Augh—baugh! you would not pay Joe
