These two neighbour men were forever falling out over a right of way. The problem was that one had to get through the other’s fields to get to his own. The thing was resolved in a peculiar way!
He put he’s coat and boots on and walked to town. In the lawyer’s office he stated his case and gave his name and address and that of his neighbour and rival. When he heared all the in’s and out’s of it,
‘Man!’, he says, ‘Begor, och aye, but ye have the great case there entirely! Shure we’ll win that aisy!’
(That’s the way them soliciting men talk. Didn’t ye know?)
He agreed till take the case and the man walked home to Fathom.
Meanwhile didn’t yer other man, not to be outdone, walk into Newry too to get he’s own lawyer.
Hell’th o me sowl, if he didn’t pick the self same lawyer as the first man, who was now back working he’s farm. When he’d heared all the in’s and out’s of it and was given the same names and addresses as before, why, even the lawyer man caught on it was the same case.
Well, that left he’em wi’ a dilemma for he couldn’t fight the same case for the two of them. He thought a wee while about it.
‘Man!’, he says,
‘Begor, och aye, but ye have the great case there entirely!
Shure you”ll win that aisy!
The on’y thing is, I’ll that busy I can’t take yer case.
BUT …
I’ll give ye a letter to take till another lawyer.
Besides meself, he’s the best lawyer in Newry.
He’ll fight it fir you.’
Hell’th o me sowl, but if yer man, no sooner than he got outa that office, didn’t he open the letter in a yard nearby and read it.
‘I’ve got a hoult of two fat geese from the country’,
it read,
‘You pluck this one and I’ll pluck t’other!’
Divil the step did he make for the other lawyer’s office at all but made a bee-line home an’ up to his neighbour’s farm.
The neighbours and former friends settled the trouble between them then and there, shook hands and never the cross word after.
An’ isn’t it a tarrib’ pity the young married wans couldn’t settle their differences the same way instead o’ making them soliciting men even fatter and richer?