Page:Life's little ironies (1894).pdf/238

“Well, come folks noticed that Andrey walked with rather wambling steps to church that morning; the truth o’t was that his nearest neighbor’s child had been christened the day before, and Andrey, having stood godfather, had atayed all night keeping up the christening, for he had said to himself, ‘Not if I live to be a thousand shall I again be made a godfather one day and a husband the next and perhaps a father the next, and therefore I'll make the most of the blessing.’ So that when he started from home in the morning he had not been in bed at all. The result was, as I say, that when he and his bride-to-be walked up the church to get married, the pa’son (who was 4 very strict man inside the church, whatever he waa outside) looked hard at Andrey, and said, very sharp:

“ How's this, my man? You are in liquor. And so early, too. I’m ashamed of you!’

“ Well, that’s true, sir,’ says Andrey. ‘But I can walk straight enough for practical purposes. I can walk a chalk-line,’ he says (meaning no offence), ‘as well as some other folk: and’— (getting hotter)—‘I reckon that if you, Pa’son Billy Toogood, had kept up a obristening all night eo thoroughly as I have done, you wouldn't be able to atand at all; damn me if you would !?

“This answer made Pa’son Billy—as they used to call him—rather spitish, not to say hot, for he waa a warm -tempered man if provoked, and be said, very decidedly: ‘Well, I cannot marry you in this state ; and I will not! Go home and get sober!’ And he slapped the book together like a rat-trap.

“Then the bride burst out crying as if her heart would break, for very fear that she would lose Andrey after all her hard work to get him, and begged and implored the pa’son to go on with the ceremony. But no.