Once a Week (magazine)/Series 1/Volume 8/Paddy O'Rafther
PADDY O’RAFTHER.
Paddy, in want of a dinner one day,
Credit all gone, and no money to pay,
Stole from the priest a fat pullet, they say,
And went to confession just afther;
“Your riv’rince,” says Paddy, “I stole this fat hen.”
“What, what!” says the priest, “at your owld thricks again?
Faith, you’d rather be staalin’ than sayin’ amen,
Paddy O’Rafther!”
“Sure you wouldn’t be angry,” says Pat, “if you knew
That the best of intintions I had in my view,
For I stole it to make it a present to you,
And you can absolve me afther.”
“Do you think,” says the priest, “I’d partake of your theft?
Of your seven small senses you must be bereft—
You’re the biggest blackguard that I know, right or left,
Paddy O’Rafther!”
“Then what shall I do with the pullet,” says Pat,
If your riv’rince won’t take it?—By this and by that
I don’t know no more than a dog nor a cat
What your riv’rince would have me be afther.”
“Why then,” says his rev’rence, “you sin-blinded owl,
Give back to the man that you stole from, his fowl,
For if you do not, ’twill be worse for your sowl,
Paddy O’Rafther.”
Says Paddy, “I ask’d him to take it—’tis thrue
As this minit I’m talkin’, your riv’rince, to you;
But he wouldn’t resaive it—so what can I do?”
Says Paddy, nigh chokin’ with laughter.
“By my throth,” says the priest, “but the case is absthruse;
If he won’t take his hen, why the man is a goose—
’Tis not the first time my advice was no use,
Paddy O’Rafther!
“But for sake of your sowl, I would sthrongly advise
To some one in want you would give your supplies,
Some widow, or orphan, with tears in their eyes;
And then, you may come to me, afther.”
So Paddy went off to the brisk Widow Hoy,
And the pullet, between them, was eaten with joy,
And, says she, “’pon my word you’re the cleverest boy,
Paddy O’Rafther!”
Then Paddy went back to the priest, the next day,
And told him the fowl he had given away
To a poor lonely widow, in want and dismay,
The loss of her spouse weeping after.
“Well, now,” says the priest, “I’ll absolve you, my lad,
For repentantly making the best of the bad,
In feeding the hungry and cheering the sad,
Paddy O’Rafther!”