I do not say many cups; the tongue then speaketh more smoothly, and the ear listeneth more benignantly; but why do I attempt to reason with you?
do I not know you for conceited creatures, with one idea--and that a foolish one;--a crotchet, for the sake of which ye would sacrifice anything, religion if required--country?
There, fling down my book, I do not wish ye to walk any farther in my company, unless you cast your nonsense away, which ye will never do, for it is the breath of your nostrils; fling down my book, it was not written to support a crotchet, for know one thing, my good people, I have invariably been an enemy to humbug.
"Well," said the tinker, after we had discoursed some time, "I little thought when I first saw you, that you were of my own trade." _Myself_ .-- Nor am I, at least not exactly.

There _is_ not much difference, 'tis true, between a tinker and a smith.
_Tinker_ .-- You are a whitesmith, then?
_Myself_ .-- Not I, I'd scorn to be anything so mean; no, friend, black's the colour; I am a brother of the horseshoe.

Success to the hammer and tongs.
_Tinker_ .-- Well, I shouldn't have thought you had been a blacksmith by your hands.
_Myself_ .-- I have seen them, however, as black as yours.

The truth is, I have not worked for many a day.
_Tinker_ .-- Where did you serve first?
_Myself_ .-- In Ireland.
_Tinker_ .-- That's a good way off, isn't it?
_Myself_ .-- Not very far; over those mountains to the left, and the run of salt water that lies behind them, there's Ireland.
_Tinker_ .-- It's a fine thing to be a scholar.
_Myself_ .-- Not half so fine as to be a tinker.
_Tinker_ .-- How you talk! _Myself_ .-- Nothing but the truth; what can be better than to be one's own master?
Now a tinker is his own master, a scholar is not?
Let us suppose the best of scholars, a schoolmaster, for example, for I suppose you will admit that no one can be higher in scholarship than a schoolmaster; do you call his a pleasant life?
I don't; we should call him a school-slave, rather than a schoolmaster.

Only conceive him in blessed weather like this, in his close school, teaching children to write in copy-books, "Evil communication corrupts good manners," or "You cannot touch pitch without defilement," or to spell out of Abedariums, or to read out of Jack Smith, or Sandford and Merton.