two-and-forty

Updated: May 7, 2025

He was now two-and-forty, he drank too much, he ate too much, he smoked too much. He was growing corpulent and scant of breath, with hanging lips and heavy eyelids; he no longer took care of his person as formerly, but went about slipshod, and indulged in the coarsest pleasantries.

Émile Zola - Fruitfulness

"Take this," said the priest, "it is as much as I can afford to give you," putting a silver fivepenny-piece into his hand; "there's a great deal of poor in my own parish." "Alas I thought, you are not a father. Indeed, sir," said the poor man, "I thought you would have allowed me to keep the silver I gave you, as how can we travel two-and-forty miles on this?"

William Carleton - The Station; The Party Fight And Funeral; The Lough Derg Pilgrim: Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of: William Carleton, Volume Three