"AH, Pat, Pat," said a schoolmistress to a thick-headed urchin into
whose muddy brain she was attempting to beat the alphabet--"I'm afraid
you'll never learn anything. Now, what's that letter, eh?"
"Sure, and I don't know ma'am," replied Pat.
"Thought you might have remembered that."
"Why, ma'am?"
"Because it has a dot over the top of it."
"Och, ma'am, I mind it well; but sure I thought it was a speck."
"Well, now remember, Pat, it's I."
"You, ma'am?"
"No! no! not U but I."
"Not I, but you, ma'am--how's that?"
"Not U, but I, blockhead!"
"Och, yis, faith; now I have it, ma'am. You mean to say, that not I but
you are a blockhead?"
"Fool! fool!" exclaimed the pedagoguess bursting with rage.
"Just as you please," quietly responded Pat, "fool or blockhead--it's no
matter, so long as yer free to own it!"