3 9090 014 557 488 
 
 Webrtar Famfly Library of Veter^iafy MecftoHie 
 
 Cufnmings School of Veterinary Medicine at 
 
 Tufts University 
 
 200 Westbofo Road 
 
 North Grafton, MA 01536 
 
 5.B.UAURIATC0. 
 
 Wnsh'nSt.BostO 
 
 EP5 
 onl 
 
IN MR. KNOX'S COUNTRY 
 
BV THE SAME AUTHORS 
 
 SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH 
 R.M. With 31 Illustrations by E. CE. SOMER- 
 VILLE. Crown 8vo, ^i.oo net. 
 
 FURTPIER EXPERIENCES OF AN 
 
 IRISH R.M. With 35 Illustrations by E. CE. 
 
 SoMERViLLE. Crown 8vo, $1.00 net. 
 SOME IRISH YESTERDAYS. With 51 
 
 Illustrations by E. CE. Somerville. Crown 
 
 8vo, $1.00 net. 
 
 *»* In this volume is included a reprint of" Slipper's 
 
 A BC 0/ Fox-hunting," with numerous illustrations. 
 
 ALL ON THE IRISH SHORE: Irish 
 Sketches. With 10 Illustrations by E. (y.. 
 Somerville. Crown 8vo, $1.00 net. 
 
 AN IRISH COUSIN. Crown 8vo, $1.50. 
 
 THE REAL CHARLOTTE. Cr. 8vo, $1.25. 
 
 THE SILVER FOX. Crown 8 vo, $1.00. 
 
 By E. CE. Somerville 
 
 THE STORY OF THE DISCONTENTED 
 LITTLE ELEPHANT. Told in Pictures and 
 Rhyme. With 7 coloured, and many other 
 Illustrations. Oblong 4to, 60 cents net. 
 
 LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO. 
 
 NEW YORK, LONDON, BOMBAY, CALCUTTA, AND MADRAS 
 
** If ever you see hounds pointing this way, don't spare spurs 
 to get to the cliff before them ! " 
 
 IPagc 4.] 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 By 
 
 E. CE. Somerville and Martin Ross 
 
 Authors of "Some Experiences of an Irish R.M.," "Further 
 
 Experiences of an Irish R.M.," •' Some Irish Yesterdays," 
 
 "All on the Irish Shore," "Dan Russel the Fox," 
 
 "The Real Charlotte," etc. etc. etc. 
 
 With 8 Illustrations by E. GE. Somerville 
 
 Longmans, Green and Co. 
 
 Fourth Avenue & 30th Street, New York 
 
 London, Bombay, Calcutta, and Madras 
 
 1915 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 I. THE AUSSOLAS MARTIN CAT 
 II. THE FINGER OF MRS. KNOX 
 
 III. THE FRIEND OF HER YOUTH 
 
 IV. HARRINGTON'S 
 V. THE MAROAN PONY . 
 
 VI. MAJOR APOLLO RIGGS . 
 VIL WHEN I FIRST MET DR. HICKEY 
 VIII. THE BOSOM OF THE McRORYS 
 IX. PUT DOWN ONE AND CARRY TWO 
 X. THE COMTE DE PRALINES . 
 XL THE SHOOTING OF SHINROE . 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I 
 
 24 
 
 50 
 
 78 
 
 106 
 
 171 
 201 
 225 
 
 284 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 **7)^ ever you see hotinds pointitig this way, 
 don!t spare spurs io get to the cliff before 
 theml'' 
 
 Kitty the Shakes 
 
 ^^ I heard scald-crozv laughter behind me in the 
 shawls''^ ...... 
 
 ^^ Lyney's a tough dog!"" . . . . 
 
 ''Walkin' Aisy'' 
 
 James ..... ... 
 
 Miss Cooney O* Rattigan .... 
 
 Miss Larkie McRory 
 
 Frontispiece 
 
 Facii, 
 
 ■/. 
 
 49 
 III 
 
 139 
 171 
 214 
 259 
 
 vii 
 
IN MR. KNOX'S COUNTRY 
 
 THE AUSSOLAS MARTIN CAT 
 
 Flurry Knox and I had driven some fourteen 
 miles to a tryst with one David Courtney, of 
 Fanaghy. But, at the appointed cross-roads, 
 David Courtney was not. It was a gleaming 
 morning in mid- May, when everything was young 
 and tense and thin and fit to run for its life, like 
 a Derby horse. Above us was such of the spa- 
 cious bare country as we had not already climbed, 
 with nothing on it taller than a thorn-bush from 
 one end of it to the other. The hill-top blazed 
 with yellow furze, and great silver balls of cloud 
 looked over its edge. Nearly as white were the 
 little white-washed houses that were tucked in 
 and out of the grey rocks on the hill-side. 
 
 ** It's up there somewhere he lives," said Flurry, 
 turning his cart across the road ; ** which'll you 
 do, hold the horse or go look for him ? " 
 
 I said I would go to look for him. I mounted 
 
 A 
 
/;; Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 the hill by a wandering bohireen resembling 
 nothing so much as a series of bony elbows ; a 
 white-washed cottage presently confronted me, 
 clinging, like a sea-anemone, to a rock. I knocked 
 at the closed door, I tapped at a window held up 
 by a great, speckled foreign shell, but without 
 success. Climbing another elbow, I repeated the 
 process at two successive houses, but without 
 avail. All was as deserted as Pompeii, and, 
 as at Pompeii, the live rock in the road was 
 worn smooth by feet and scarred with wheel 
 tracks. 
 
 An open doorway faced me ; I stooped beneath 
 its lintel and asked of seeming vacancy if there 
 were '* anyone inside." There was no reply. I 
 advanced into a clean kitchen, with a well-swept 
 earthen floor, and was suddenly aware of a human 
 presence very close to me. 
 
 A youngish woman, with a heavy mop of dark 
 hair, and brown eyes staring at the opposite wall, 
 was sitting at the end of a settle behind the door. 
 Every bit of her was trembling. She looked past 
 me as if I did not exist. Feeling uncertain as to 
 whether she or I were mad, I put to her my 
 question as to where David Courtney lived, with- 
 out much expectation of receiving an answer. 
 
 Still shaking from head to foot, and without 
 turning her eyes, she replied : 
 
 2 
 
Kitty the Shakes. 
 
The Aussolas Martin Cat 
 
 "A small piece to the north. The house on 
 the bare rock." 
 
 The situation showed no symptom of expansion; 
 I faltered thanks to her profile and returned to 
 Flurry. 
 
 The house of David Courtney produced David 
 Courtney's large and handsome wife, who told us 
 that Himself was gone to a funeral, and all that 
 was in the village was gone to it, but there was 
 a couple of the boys below in the bog. 
 
 ** What have they done with those cubs?" 
 asked Flurry. 
 
 Mrs. Courtney shot at him a dark-blue side- 
 glance, indulgent and amused, and, advancing to 
 the edge of her rock terrace, made a trumpet of 
 her hands and projected a long call down the 
 valley. 
 
 ''Mikeen! Con! Come hither!" 
 
 From a brown patch in the green below came 
 a far-away response, and we presently saw two 
 tall lads coming towards us, running up the hill 
 as smoothly and easily as a couple of hounds. 
 Their legs were bare and stained with bog-mould, 
 they were young and light and radiant as the 
 May weather. 
 
 I did not withhold my opinion of them from 
 their proprietor. 
 
 ** Why, then, I have six more as good as 
 
 3 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 them!" replied Mrs. Courtney, her hands on 
 her hips. 
 
 We took the horse from the shafts and pushed 
 him, deeply suspicious, into a darksome lair, in one 
 corner of which glimmered a pale object, either 
 pig or calf. When this was done we followed 
 Mikeen and Con up through blossoming furze 
 and blue-grey rock to the ridge of the hill, and 
 there came face to face with the vast blue dazzle 
 of the Atlantic, with a long line of cliffs standing 
 it off, in snowy lather, as far as eye could follow 
 them into the easterly haze. 
 
 ** That's the cliff over-right you now," said one 
 of the boys, pointing downwards, with a hand 
 dark with bog-stuff, to a grey and green wedge 
 thrust out into the blue. "It's there where she 
 have her den. She have a pat' down for herself 
 in it — it's hardly a bird could walk it — the five 
 pups was following her, and two o' them rolled 
 down into the strand, and our dogs held them. 
 Ourselves was below in the cove gathering 
 seaweed." 
 
 '' Make a note of it now. Major," said Flurry, 
 " and if ever you see hounds pointing this way, 
 don't spare spurs to get to the cliff before them ! " 
 
 " Why don't you get them out and blow up the 
 place ? " 
 
 ** Is it get them out of that hole ! " said one of 
 
 4 
 
The Aussolas Martin Cat 
 
 the boys. ** If all the foxes in Europe was inside 
 in it you couldn't get them out ! " 
 
 *' We mightn't want them either," said Flurry, 
 his eye ranging the face of the cliff, and assimi- 
 lating its uncompromising negations. 
 
 " Then there's plenty that would ! " returned 
 Mikeen, looking at us with an eye as blue and 
 bright as the sea. ** There was a man east here 
 that cot a fox and her five young ones in the one 
 night, and he got three half-crowns for every lad 
 o' them ! " 
 
 **He'd be turned out of hell for doing that," 
 said Flurry, very severely. 
 
 We went back to the cottage on the rock, and 
 the matter entered upon its more serious phase. 
 I took no part in the negotiations, and employed 
 myself in converse with Mrs. Courtney, who — it 
 may not be out of place to recall — informed me, 
 amongst other domestic details, that the farm 
 wouldn't carry all the children she had, and that 
 nowadays, when the ger'rls would be going to 
 America, it's white nightdresses and flannelette 
 nightdresses she should give them ; and further, 
 that she thought, if she lived to be as old as a 
 goat, she'd never see them so tasty. 
 
 On the way home I asked Flurry what he was 
 going to do with the two cubs, now immured in a 
 market basket under the seat of the dog-cart. 
 
 5 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 Flurry was ambiguous and impenetrable ; there 
 were certain matters in which Flurry trusted 
 nobody, knowing the darkness of his own heart 
 and the inelasticity of other people's points of 
 view. 
 
 " That woman, you know, that told you the 
 way," he remarked, with palpable irrelevance, 
 " * Kitty the Shakes,' they call her — they say she 
 mightn't speak to anyone once in three months, 
 and she shakes that way then. It's a pity that 
 was the house you went into first." 
 
 ** Why so?" said I. 
 
 " That's the why ! " said Flurry. 
 
 It was during the week following this expedi- 
 tion that Philippa and I stayed for a few days at 
 Aussolas, where Flurry and Mrs. Flurry were now 
 more or less permanently in residence. The posi- 
 tion of guest in old Mrs. Knox's house was one 
 often fraught with more than the normal anxie- 
 ties proper to guests. Her mood was like the 
 weather, a matter incalculable and beyond con- 
 trol ; it governed the day, and was the leit 
 motif in the affairs of the household. I hope 
 that it may be given to me to live until my 
 mood also is as a dark tower full of armed 
 men. 
 
 On the evening of our arrival my wife, whose 
 
 6 
 
^he Aussolas Martin Cat 
 
 perception of danger is comparable only to that 
 of the wild elephant, warned me that Mrs. Knox 
 was rheumatic, and that I was on no account 
 to condole with her. Later on the position re- 
 vealed itself. Mrs. Knox's Dublin doctor had 
 ordered her to Buxton with as little delay as 
 possible ; furthermore, she was to proceed to 
 Brighton for the summer, possibly for the winter 
 also. She had put Aussolas on a house agent's 
 books, " out of spite," Flurry said sourly ; ** I 
 suppose she thinks I'd pop the silver, or sell the 
 feather beds." 
 
 It was a tribute to Mrs. Knox's character that 
 her grandson treated her as a combatant in his 
 own class, and did not for an instant consider 
 himself bound to allow her weight for either 
 age or sex. 
 
 At dinner that night Mrs. Knox was as favour- 
 able to me as usual ; yet it was pointed out to 
 me by Mrs. Flurry that she was wearing two 
 shawls instead of one, always an indication to 
 be noted as a portent of storm. At bridge she 
 played a very sharp-edged game, in grimness 
 scarcely mitigated by two well-brought-off revokes 
 on the part of Philippa, who was playing with 
 Flurry ; a gross and unprincipled piece of chivalry 
 on my wife's part that was justly resented by 
 Mr. Knox. 
 
/;; Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 Next morning the lady of the house was 
 invisible, and Mullins, her maid, was heard to 
 lament to an unknown sympathiser on the back 
 stairs that the divil in the wild woods wouldn't 
 content her. 
 
 In the grove at Aussolas, on a height behind 
 the castle, romantically named Mount Ida, there 
 is a half-circle of laurels that screens, with pleas- 
 ing severity, an ancient bench and table of stone. 
 The spot commands a fair and far prospect of 
 Aussolas Lake, and, nearer at hand, it permitted 
 a useful outlook upon the kitchen garden and its 
 affairs. When old Mrs. Knox first led me thither 
 to admire the view, she mentioned that it was a 
 place to which she often repaired when the cook 
 was on her trail with enquiries as to what the 
 servants were to have for dinner. 
 
 Since our expedition to Fanaghy the glory of 
 the weather had remained unshaken, and each 
 day there was a shade of added warmth in the 
 sunshine and a more caressing quality in the 
 wind. Flurry and I went to Petty Sessions in 
 the morning, and returned to find that Mrs. Knox 
 was still in her room, and that our respective 
 wives were awaiting us with a tea-basket in the 
 classic shades of Mount Ida. Mrs. Knox had 
 that mysterious quality of attraction given to 
 some persons, and some dogs, of forming a social 
 
 8 
 
The Aussolas Martin Gat 
 
 vortex into which lesser beings inevitably swim ; 
 yet I cannot deny that her absence induced a 
 sneaking sensation of holiday. Had she been 
 there, for example, Mrs. Flurry would scarcely 
 have indicated, with a free gesture, the luxuriance 
 of the asparagus beds in the kitchen garden below, 
 nor promised to have a bundle of it cut for us 
 before we went home ; still less would she and 
 Philippa have smoked cigarettes, a practice con- 
 sidered by Mrs. Knox to be, in women, several 
 degrees worse than drinking. 
 
 To us there., through the green light of young 
 beech leaves and the upstriking azure glare of 
 myriads of bluebells, came the solid presence of 
 John Kane. It would be hard to define John 
 Kane's exact status at Aussolas ; Flurry had once 
 said that, whether it was the house, or the garden, 
 or the stables, whatever it'd be that you wanted 
 to do, John Kane'd be in it before you to hinder 
 you ; but that had been in a moment of excus- 
 able irritation, when John Kane had put a padlock 
 on the oat loft, and had given the key to Mrs. 
 Knox. 
 
 John Kane now ascended to us, and came to 
 a standstill, with his soft black hat in his hands ; 
 it was dusty, so were his boots, and the pockets 
 of his coat bulked large. Among the green 
 drifts and flakes of the pale young beech leaves 
 
 9 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 his bushy beard looked as red as a squirrel's 
 tail. 
 
 ** I have the commands here, Master Flurry," 
 he began, **and it's to yourself I'd sooner give 
 them. As for them ger'rls that's inside in the 
 kitchen, they have every pup in the place in a 
 thrain at the back door, and, if your tobacco went 
 asthray, it's me that would be blemt." 
 
 *' The commands " — i.e. some small parcels 
 — were laid on the stone table, minor pockets 
 yielded an assortment of small moneys that were 
 each in turn counted and placed in heaps by 
 their consort parcels. 
 
 " And as for the bottle, the misthress wrote 
 down for me," said John Kane, his eye rounding 
 up his audience like a sheep-dog, " I got me 
 'noueh with the same bottle. But sure them's 
 the stupidest people in Hennessy's ! 'Twas to 
 Hennessy himself I gave the misthress's paper, 
 and he was there looking at it for a while. 'What 
 have she in it ? ' says he to me. * How would I 
 know,' says I, * me that have no learning ? ' He 
 got the spy-glass to it then, and 'twas shortly till 
 all was in the shop was gethered in it looking at 
 it. * Twould take an expairt to read it ! ' says 
 one fella " 
 
 ** True for him ! " said Flurry. 
 
 <♦ * She have written it in Latin!' says 
 
 lO 
 
T^he Aussolas Martin Cat 
 
 Hennessy. * Faith she's able to write it that 
 way, or anny other way for yee ! ' says I. ' Well, 
 I'll tell ye now what ye'll do,' says Hennessy. 
 'There's a boy in the Medical Hall, and he's able 
 to read all languages. Show it to him,' says he. 
 I showed it then to the boy in the Medical Hall. 
 Sure, the very minute he looked at it — * Elliman's 
 Embrocation,' says he." John Kane waved his 
 hand slightly to one side ; his gestures had 
 throughout been supple and restrained. ** Sure 
 them's the stupidest people in Hennessy's ! " 
 
 My sympathies were with the house of Hen- 
 nessy ; I, too, had encountered Mrs. Knox's hand- 
 writing, and realised the high imaginative and 
 deductive qualities needed in its interpreter. 
 No individual word was decipherable, but, with 
 a bold reader, groups could be made to conform 
 to a scheme based on probabilities. 
 
 *' You can tell the mistress what they were 
 saying at Hennessy's about her," said Flurry. 
 
 " I will, your honour," replied John, accepting 
 the turn in the conversation as easily as a skilful 
 motorist changes gear. ** I suppose you'll have 
 a job for me at Tory Lodge when I get the sack 
 from the misthress ? " 
 
 *' No, but they tell me I'm to be put on the 
 Old Age Pension Committee," returned Flurry, 
 ** and I might get a chance to do something for 
 
 II 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 you if you'd give over dyeing that beard you 
 have." 
 
 "I'm sorry to say it's the Almighty is dyeing 
 my beard for me, sir," replied John Kane, finger- 
 ing a grey streak on his chin, ** and I think He's 
 after giving yourself a touch, too ! " He glanced 
 at the side of Flurry's head, and his eye travelled 
 on to mine. There was an almost flagrant 
 absence of triumph in it. 
 
 He put aside a beechen bough with his hand ; 
 "I'll leave the things on the hall table for you, 
 sir," he said, choosing the perfect moment for 
 departure, and passed out of sight. The bough 
 swung into place behind him ; it was like an exit 
 in a pastoral play. 
 
 *' She never told me about the embrocation," 
 said Sally, leaning back against the mossed stones 
 of the bench and looking up into the web of 
 branches. " She never will admit that she's ill." 
 
 " Poor old Mrs. Knox ! " said Philippa com- 
 passionately, " I thought she looked so ill last 
 night when she was playing bridge. Such a tiny 
 fragile thing, sitting wrapped up in that great old 
 chair " 
 
 Philippa is ineradicably romantic, yet my mind, 
 too, dwelt upon the old autocrat lying there, ill 
 and undefeated, in the heart of her ancient 
 fortress. 
 
 12 
 
The Aussolas Martin Cat 
 
 ** Fragile!" said Flurry, "you'd best not tell 
 her that. With my grandmother no one's ill 
 till they're dead, and no one's dead till they're 
 buried ! " 
 
 Away near the house the peacock uttered his 
 defiant screech, a note of exclamation that seemed 
 entirely appropriate to Aussolas ; the turkey-cock 
 in the yard accepted the challenge with effusion, 
 and from further away the voice of Mrs. Knox's 
 Kerry bull, equally instant in taking offence, 
 ascended the gamut of wrath from growl to yell. 
 Blended with these voices was another — a man's 
 voice, in loud harangue, advancing down the long 
 beech walk to the kitchen garden. As it ap- 
 proached, the wood-pigeons bolted in panic, with 
 distracted clappings of wings, from the tall firs by 
 the garden wall in which they were wont to sit 
 arranging plans of campaign with regard to the 
 fruit. We sat in tense silence. The latch of the 
 garden gate clicked, and the voice said in sten- 
 torian tones : 
 
 ** My father 'e kept a splendid table!" 
 
 " I hear wheels ! " breathed Sally Knox. 
 
 A hawthorn tree and a laburnum tree leaned 
 over the garden gate, and from beneath their 
 canopy of cream and pale gold there emerged 
 the bath-chair of Mrs. Knox, with Mrs. Knox 
 herself seated in it. It was propelled by Mullins 
 
 13 
 
In Mr, KnoDc's Country 
 
 — even at that distance the indignation of Mullins 
 was discernible — and it progressed up the central 
 path. Beside it walked the personage whose 
 father had kept a splendid table. Parenthetically 
 it may be observed that he did credit to it. 
 
 ** Glory be to Moses ! Look at my grand- 
 mother ! " said Flurry under his breath. ** How 
 fragile she is! Who the dickens has she got 
 hold of?" 
 
 ** He thinks she's deaf, anyhow/' said Sally. 
 
 ** That's where he makes the mistake ! " re- 
 turned Flurry. 
 
 ** I don't see your glawss, Mrs. Knox," shouted 
 the stout gentleman. 
 
 " That's very possible," replied the incisive 
 and slightly cracked voice of Mrs. Knox, ** be- 
 cause the little that is left of it is in the mortar 
 on the wall, to keep thieves out, which it fails 
 to do." 
 
 The pair passed on, and paused, still in high 
 converse, at the asparagus beds ; Mullins, behind 
 the bath-chair, wiped her indignant brow. 
 
 "You'll go home without the asparagus," 
 whispered Flurry, *' she has every stick of it 
 counted by now ! " 
 
 They moved on, heading for the further gate 
 of the garden. 
 
 ** I'll bet a sovereign he's come after the house ! " 
 
 14 
 
T^he Aussolas Martin Cat 
 
 Flurry continued, following the cortege with a 
 malevolent eye. 
 
 Later, when we returned to the house, we 
 found a motor-bicycle, dusty and dwarfish, leaning 
 against the hall door steps. Within was the 
 sound of shouting. It was then half-past seven. 
 
 *' Is it possible that she's keeping him for 
 dinner ? " said Sally. 
 
 "Take care he's not staying for the night!" 
 said Flurry. ** Look at the knapsack he has on 
 the table ! " 
 
 ** There's only one room he can possibly have," 
 said Mrs. Flurry, with a strange and fixed gaze 
 at her lord, " and that's the James the Second 
 room. The others are cleared for the painters." 
 
 '♦ Oh, that will be all right," replied her lord, 
 easily. 
 
 When I came down to dinner I found the new 
 arrival planted on his short, thick legs in front of 
 the fireplace, still shouting at Mrs. Knox, who, 
 notwithstanding the sinister presence of the two 
 shawls of ill-omen, was listening with a propitious 
 countenance. She looked very tired, and I com- 
 mitted xh^ gaucherie of saying I was sorry to hear 
 she had not been well. 
 
 *' Oh, that was nothing!" said Mrs. Knox, 
 with a wave of her tiny, sunburnt, and be- 
 diamonded hand. ** I've shaken that off, Mike 
 
 ^5 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 dewdrops from the lion's mane ! ' This is Mr. 
 Tebbutts, from — er — England, Major Yeates." 
 
 Mr. Tebbutts, after a bewildered stare, presum- 
 ably in search of the lion, proclaimed his gratifica- 
 tion at meeting me, in a voice that might have 
 been heard in the stable yard. 
 
 At dinner the position developed apace. The 
 visitor was, it appeared, the representative of a 
 patriarchal family, comprising samples of all the 
 relationships mentioned in the table of affinities, 
 and fortissimo, and at vast length, he laid down 
 their personal histories and their various require- 
 ments. It was pretty to see how old Mrs. Knox, 
 ill as she looked, and suffering as she undoubtedly 
 was, mastered the bowling. 
 
 Did the Tebbutts ladies exact bathing for their 
 young ? The lake supplied it. 
 
 (** It's all mud and swallow-holes ! " said Flurry 
 in an audible aside.) 
 
 Did the brothers demand trout fishing? the 
 schoolboys rabbit shooting? the young ladies 
 lawn tennis and society ? — all were theirs, especi- 
 ally the latter. ** My grandson and his wife will 
 be within easy reach in their own house, Tory 
 Lodge ! " 
 
 The remark about the swallow-holes had not 
 been lost upon the Lady of the Lake. 
 
 Mrs. Knox had her glass of port at dessert, an 
 
 16 
 
The Aussolas Martin Cat 
 
 act equivalent to snapping her rheumatic fingers 
 in our faces, and withdrew, stiff but erect, and still 
 on the best of terms with her prospective tenant. 
 As I held the door open for her, she said to me : 
 
 " * 'Twas whispered in heaven, 'twas muttered 
 in hell.'" 
 
 By an amazing stroke of luck I was enabled to 
 continue : 
 
 *' * And echo caught softly the sound as it fell ! ' " 
 with a glance at Mr. Tebbutts that showed I was 
 aware the quotation was directed at his missing 
 aspirates. 
 
 As the door closed, the visitor turned to Flurry 
 and said impressively : 
 
 •' There's just one thing, Mr. Knox, I should 
 like to mention, if you will allow me. Are the 
 drains quite in order ? " 
 
 ** God knows," said Flurry, pulling hard at a 
 badly-lighted cigarette and throwing himself into 
 a chair by the turf fire. 
 
 *' Mrs. Knox's health has held out against them 
 for about sixty years," I remarked. 
 
 *♦ Well, as to that," replied Mr. Tebbutts, " I 
 feel it is only right to mention that the dear old 
 lady was very giddy with me in the garden this 
 afternoon." 
 
 Flurry received this remarkable statement with- 
 out emotion. 
 
 17 B 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 " Maybe she's taken a fancy to you! " he said 
 brutally. ** If it wasn't that it was whipped cream." 
 
 Mr. Tebbutts' bulging eyes sought mine in 
 complete mystification ; I turned to the fire, and 
 to it revealed my emotions. Flurry was not at 
 all amused. 
 
 ** Well — er — I understood her maid to say she 
 *ad bin ailing," said the guest after a pause. "I'd 
 have called it a kind of a megrim myself, and, as 
 I say, I certainly perceived a sort of charnel-'ouse 
 smell in the room I'm in. And look 'ere, Mr. 
 Knox, 'ere's another thing. 'Ow about rats? 
 You know what ladies are ; there's one of my 
 sisters-in-law, Mrs. William Tebbutts, who'd just 
 scream the 'ouse down if she 'eard the 'alf of what 
 was goin' on behind the panelling in my room 
 this evening." 
 
 *' Anyone that's afraid of rats had better keep 
 out of Aussolas," said Flurry, getting up with a 
 yawn. 
 
 ** Mr. Tebbutts is in the James the Second 
 room, isn't he?" said I, idly. ''Isn't that the 
 room with the powdering-closet off it ? " 
 
 " It is," said Flurry. ** Anything else you'd 
 like to know?" 
 
 I recognised that someone had blundered, 
 presumably myself, and made a move for the 
 drawing-room. 
 
 i8 
 
The Aussolas Martin Cat 
 
 Mrs. Knox had retired when we got there ; my 
 wife and Mrs. Flurry followed suit as soon as 
 might be ; and the guest said that, if the gentle- 
 men had no objection, he thought he'd turn in too. 
 
 Flurry and I shut the windows — fresh air is a 
 foible of the female sex — heaped turf on the fire, 
 drew up chairs in front of it, and composed our- 
 selves for that sweetest sleep of all, the sleep that 
 has in it the bliss of abandonment, and is made 
 almost passionate by the deep underlying know- 
 ledge that it can be but temporary. 
 
 How long we had slumbered I cannot say ; it 
 seemed but a moment when a door opened in 
 our dreams, and the face of Mr. Tebbutts was 
 developed before me in the air like the face of 
 the Cheshire cat, only without the grin. 
 
 " Mr. Knox ! Gentlemen ! " he began, as if he 
 were addressing a meeting. The thunder had 
 left his voice ; he stopped to take breath. He 
 was in his shirt and trousers, and the laces of his 
 boots trailed on the floor behind him. "I've 
 'ad a bit of a start upstairs. I was just winding 
 up my watch at the dressing-table when I saw 
 some kind of an animal gloide past the fireplace 
 and across the room " 
 
 ** What was it like ? " interrupted Flurry, sit- 
 ting up in his chair. 
 
 ** Well, Mr. Knox, it's 'ard to say what it was 
 19 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 like. It wasn't a cat, nor yet it wasn't what you 
 could call a squirrel " 
 
 Flurry got on to his feet. 
 
 "By the living Jingo!" he said, turning to 
 me an awestruck countenance ; ** he's seen the 
 Aussolas Martin Cat ! " 
 
 I had never before heard of the Aussolas 
 Martin Cat, and it is indisputable that a slight 
 chill crept down my backbone. 
 
 Mr. Tebbutts' eyes bulged more than ever, 
 and his lower lip fell. 
 
 " What way did it go ? " said Flurry ; " did it 
 look at you ? " 
 
 ** It seemed to disappear in that recess by the 
 door," faltered the seer of the vision; **it just 
 vanished ! " 
 
 *' I don't know if it's for my grandmother or 
 for me," said Flurry in a low voice, " but it's a 
 death in the house anyway." 
 
 The colour in Mr. Tebbutts' face deepened to 
 a glossy sealing-wax red. 
 
 " If one of you gents would come upstairs with 
 me," he said, " I think I'll just get my traps 
 together. I can be back at the 'otel in 'alf an 
 our 
 
 Flurry and I accompanied Mr. Tebbutts to 
 the James the Second room. Over Mrs. Knox's 
 door there were panes of glass, and light came 
 
 20 
 
The Aussolas Martin Cat 
 
 forth from them. (It is my belief that Mrs. 
 Knox never goes to bed.) We trod softly as we 
 passed it, and went along the uncarpeted boards 
 of the Musicians' Gallery above the entrance hall. 
 
 There certainly was a peculiar odour in the 
 James the Second room, and the adjective 
 "■ charnel-'ouse " had not been misapplied. 
 
 I thought about a dead rat, and decided that 
 the apparition had been one of the bandit tribe 
 of tawny cats that inhabited the Aussolas stables. 
 And yet legends of creatures that haunted old 
 houses and followed old families came back to me ; 
 of one in particular, a tale of medieval France, 
 wherein "a yellow furry animal" ran down the 
 throat of a sleeping lady named Sagesse. 
 
 Mr. Tebbutts, by this time fully dressed, was 
 swiftly bestowing a brush and comb in his knap- 
 sack. Perhaps he, too, had read the legend 
 about Madame Sagesse. Flurry was silently, 
 and with a perturbed countenance, examining the 
 room ; rapping at the panelling and peering up 
 the cavernous chimney ; I heard him sniff as he 
 did so. Possibly he also held the dead-rat 
 theory. He opened the flap in the door of the 
 powdering-closet, and, striking a match, held it 
 through the opening. I looked over his shoulder, 
 and had a glimpse of black feathers on the floor, 
 and a waft of a decidedly ** charnel-'ouse " nature. 
 
 21 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 *' Damn ! " muttered Flurry to himself, and 
 slammed down the flap. 
 
 '' I think, sir," said Mr. Tebbutts, with his 
 knapsack in his hand and his cap on his head, 
 " I must ask you to let Mrs. Knox know that 
 this 'ouse won't suit Mrs. William Tebbutts. 
 You might just say I was called away rather 
 sudden. Of course, you won't mention what I 
 saw just now — I wouldn't wish to upset the pore 
 old lady " 
 
 We followed him from the room, and treading 
 softly as before, traversed the gallery, and began 
 to descend the slippery oak stairs. Flurry was 
 still looking furtively about him, and the thought 
 crossed my mind that in the most hard-headed 
 Irishman there wanders a vein of superstition. 
 
 Before we had reached the first landing, the 
 violent ringing of a handbell broke forth in the 
 room with the light over the door, followed by a 
 crash of fire-irons ; then old Mrs. Knox's voice 
 calling imperatively for Mullins. 
 
 There was a sound of rushing, slippered feet, 
 a bumping of furniture ; with a squall from 
 Mullins the door flew open, and I was endowed 
 with a never-to-be-forgotten vision of Mrs. Knox, 
 swathed in hundreds of shawls, in the act of 
 hurling the tongs at some unseen object. 
 
 Almost simultaneously there was a scurry of 
 
 22 
 
The Aussolas Martin Cat 
 
 claws on the oak floor above us, Mrs. Knox's 
 door was slammed, and something whizzed past 
 me. I am thankful to think that I possess, as a 
 companion vision to that of Mrs. Knox, the face 
 of Mr. Tebbutts with the candle liofht on it as 
 he looked up from the foot of the stairs and saw 
 the Aussolas Martin Cat in his track. 
 
 ''Look out, Tebbutts!" yelled Flurry. *' It's 
 you he's after ! '* 
 
 Mr. Tebbutts here passed out of the incident 
 into the night, and the Aussolas Martin Cat was 
 swallowed up by a large hole in the surbase in 
 the corner of the first landing. 
 
 *' He'll come out in the wine-cellar," said 
 Flurry, with the calm tkat was his in moments of 
 crisis, **the way the cat did." 
 
 I pulled myself together. 
 
 ** What's happened to the other Fanaghy cub ? " 
 I enquired with, I hope, equal calmness. 
 
 " He's gone to blazes," replied Flurry ; ** there 
 isn't a wall in this house that hasn't a way in it. 
 I knew I'd never have luck with them after you 
 asking the way from Kitty the Shakes." 
 
 As is usual in my dealings with Flurry, the 
 fault was mine. 
 
 While I reflected on this, the stillness of the 
 night was studded in a long and diminishing line 
 by the running pant of the motor-bicycle. 
 
 23 
 
II 
 
 THE FINGER OF MRS. KNOX 
 
 A BEING Stood in a dark corner under the 
 gallery of the hall at Aussolas Castle ; a being 
 who had arrived noiselessly on bare feet, and 
 now revealed its presence by hard breathing. 
 
 '' Come in, Mary," commanded old Mrs. Knox 
 without turning her head ; '' make up the fire." 
 
 " I will, ma'am," murmured the being, advanc- 
 ing with an apologetic eye upon me, and an 
 undulating gait suggestive of a succession of 
 incipient curtsies. 
 
 She was carrying an armful of logs, and, 
 having stacked them on the fire in a heap calcu- 
 lated to set alight any chimney less roomy than 
 the Severn Tunnel, she retired by way of the 
 open hall door with the same deferential stealth 
 with which she had entered. 
 
 '* The hen-woman," explained Mrs. Knox 
 casually, ''the only person in this place who 
 knows a dry log from a wet one." 
 
 Like all successful rulers, Mrs. Knox had the 
 power of divining in her underlings their special 
 gifts, and of wresting them to the sphere in which 
 
 24 
 
The Finger of Mrs. Knox 
 
 they shone, no matter what their normal functions 
 might be. She herself pervaded all spheres. 
 
 " There's no pie but my grandmother has a 
 finger in it," was Flurry Knox's epitome of these 
 high qualities ; a sour tribute from one free- 
 booter to another. 
 
 "If the Mistress want a thing she mus' have 
 it!" was the comment of John Kane, the game- 
 keeper, as he threw down the spade with which 
 he was digging out a ferret, and armed himself 
 with a holly-bush wherewith to sweep the drawing- 
 room chimney. 
 
 As Mrs. Knox and I sat by the hen-woman's 
 noble fire, and gossiped, the cook panted in 
 with the tea-tray ; the butler, it appeared, had 
 gone out to shoot a rabbit for dinner. All these 
 things pointed to the fact that Mrs. Knox's 
 granddaughter-in-law, Mrs. Flurry, was not, at 
 the moment, in residence at Aussolas. The 
 Jungle was creeping in ; Sally Knox, by virtue, 
 I suppose, of her English mother, spasmodically 
 endeavoured to keep it out, but with her depar- 
 ture the Wild triumphed. 
 
 It was an October afternoon, grey and still ; 
 the hall door stood open, as indeed it always did 
 at Aussolas, and on the topmost of the broad 
 limestone steps Mrs. Knox's white woolly dog 
 sat, and magisterially regarded lake and wood 
 
 25 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 and lawn. The tawny bracken flowed like a 
 sea to the palings that bounded the lawn ; along 
 its verge squatted the rabbits, motionless for the 
 most part, sometimes languidly changing their 
 ground, with hops like the dying efforts of a 
 mechanical toy. The woolly dog had evidently 
 learned in many fruitless charges the futility of 
 frontal attack ; a close and menacing supervision 
 from the altitude of the steps was all that was 
 consistent with dignity, but an occasional strong 
 shudder betrayed his emotion. The open door 
 framed also a pleasing view of my new car, 
 standing in beautiful repose at the foot of the 
 steps, splashed with the mud of a twenty-mile 
 run from an outlying Petty Sessions Court ; her 
 presence added, for me, the touch of romance. 
 
 It was twilight in the back of the hall by the 
 fireplace ; the flames of the logs, branching like 
 antlers, made a courteous and not too searching 
 inquisition into dark corners, and lighted with 
 a very suitable evasiveness Mrs. Knox's Witch 
 of Endor profile. She wore her usual velvet 
 bonnet ; the rest of her attire recalled to my 
 memory the summary of it by her kinswoman. 
 Lady Knox, " A rag bag held together by dia- 
 mond brooches." Yet, according to her wont, 
 her personality was the only thing that counted ; 
 it reduced all externals to a proper insignificance. 
 
 26 
 
The Finger of Mrs, Knox 
 
 The object of my visit had ostensibly been to see 
 her grandson, but Flurry was away for the night. 
 
 " He's sleeping at Tory Lodge," said Mrs. 
 Knox. " He's cubbing at Drumvoortneen, and 
 he has to start early. He tried to torment me 
 into allowing him to keep the hounds in the 
 yard here this season, but I had the pleasure of 
 telling him that old as I might be, I still retained 
 possession of my hearing, my sense of smell, 
 and, to a certain extent, of my wits." 
 
 " I should have thought," I said discreetly, 
 ** that Tory Lodge was more in the middle of 
 his country." 
 
 '* Undoubtedly," replied Flurry's grandmother; 
 " but it is not in the middle of my straw, my 
 meal, my buttermilk, my firewood, and anything 
 else of mine that can be pilfered for the uses 
 of a kennel ! " She concluded with a chuckle 
 that might have been uttered by a scald-crow. 
 
 I was pondering a diplomatic reply, when the 
 quiet evening was rent by a shrill challenge from 
 the woolly dog. 
 
 'Thy sentinel am I!" he vociferated, bark- 
 ing himself backwards into the hall, in proper 
 strategic retreat upon his base. 
 
 A slow foot ascended the steps, and the twi- 
 light in the hall deepened as a man's figure 
 appeared in the doorway ; a middle-aged man, 
 
 27 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 with his hat in one hand, and in the other a thick 
 stick, with which he was making respectfully in- 
 timidating demonstrations to the woolly dog. 
 
 **Who are you?" called out Mrs. Knox from 
 her big chair. 
 
 ** I'm Casey, your ladyship," replied the visitor 
 in a deplorable voice, "■ from Killoge." 
 
 ** Cornelius Casey? " queried Mrs. Knox. 
 
 ** No, but his son, your honour ma'am, Stephen 
 Casey, one of the tenants.'* 
 
 " Well, come in, Stephen," said Mrs. Knox 
 affably, supplementing her spectacles with a gold- 
 rimmed single eye-glass, and looking at him with 
 interest. ** I knew your father well in old times, 
 when he used to stop the earths in Killoge Wood 
 for the Colonel. They tell me that's all cut down 
 now?" 
 
 ** There's not the boiling of a kettle left in it 
 afther Goggin, my lady ! " said Casey eagerly. 
 Mrs. Knox cut him short. 
 
 ** Many a good hunt the Colonel had out of 
 Killoge, and I too, for the matter of that ! " she 
 added, turning to me; **my cousin Bessie 
 Hamilton and I were the only huntresses in the 
 country in those days, and people thought us 
 shocking tomboys, I believe. Now, what with 
 driving motors and riding astride, the gentlemen 
 are all ladies, and the ladies are gentlemen ! ' 
 
 28 
 
T'he Finger of Mrs, Knox 
 
 With another scald-crow chuckle she turned to 
 Casey. '' Did your father ever tell you of the 
 great hunt out of Killoge into the Fanaghy cliffs? " 
 
 " He did, your ladyship, he did ! " responded 
 Casey, with a touch of life in his lamentable 
 voice. " Often he told me that it knocked fire 
 from his eyes to see yourself facing in at the 
 Killoge river." 
 
 •* I was riding Bijou, the grandmother of old 
 Trinket, in that run," said Mrs. Knox, leaning 
 back in her chair, with a smile that had some- 
 thing of the light of other days in it. 
 
 I remembered the story that Colonel Knox 
 had run away with her after a hunt, and wondered 
 if that had been the occasion when she had 
 knocked fire from the eyes of Cornelius Casey. 
 
 Her thin old hand drooped in momentary 
 languor over the arm of her chair ; and the woolly 
 dog thrust his nose under it, with a beady eye 
 fixed upon the hot cakes. 
 
 " Here ! " said Mrs. Knox, sitting up, and 
 throwing a buttery bun on the floor. '* Be off 
 with you! Well, Casey," she went on, ** what 
 is it you want with me ? " 
 
 ** Great trouble I got, Mrs. Knox, your honour 
 ma'am," replied Casey from the door-mat, *' great 
 trouble entirely." He came a step or two nearer. 
 He had a long, clean-shaved face, with mournful 
 
 29 
 
In Mr, Knoxs Country 
 
 eyes, like a sick bloodhound, and the enviable, 
 countryman's thatch of thick, strong hair, with 
 scarcely a touch of grey in it. 
 
 " That Goggin, that has the shop at Killoge 
 Cross, has me processed. I'm pairsecuted with 
 him ; and the few little bastes I has, and me 
 donkey and all — " his voice thinned to a whimper, 
 " he's to drive them to-morrow " 
 
 '* I suppose that's Goggin, the Gombeen?" 
 said Mrs. Knox ; " how were you fool enough to 
 get into dealings with him ? " 
 
 The statement of Casey's wrongs occupied 
 quite ten minutes, and was generous in detail. 
 His land was bad, ever and always. The grass 
 that was in it was as bare as that you could pick 
 pins in it. He had no pushing land at all for 
 cattle. Didn't he buy a heifer at Scabawn fair 
 and the praisings she got was beyant all 
 raves, and he had her one month, and kinder 
 company he never had, and she giving seven 
 pints at every meal, and wasn't that the divil's 
 own produce ? One month, indeed, was all he 
 had her till she got a dropsy, and the dropsy 
 supported her for a while, and when it left her 
 she faded away. And didn't his wife lose all her 
 hens in one week ? ** They fell dead on her, 
 like hailstones ! " He ceased, and a tear wan- 
 dered down the channels in his long cheek. 
 
 30 
 
T^he Finger of Mrs, Knox 
 
 "How much do you owe Goggin?" asked 
 Mrs. Knox sharply. 
 
 What Casey owed to Goggin had, as might 
 have been expected, but a remote relation to the 
 sum that Goggin was now endeavouring to ex- 
 tract from Casey. At the heart of the transaction 
 was a shop account, complicated by loans of 
 single pounds (and in my mind's eye I could see, 
 and with my mind's nose I could smell, the dirty 
 crumpled notes). It was further entangled by 
 per-contra accounts of cribs of turf, scores of eggs, 
 and a day's work now and again. I had, from 
 the judgment seat, listened to many such recitals, 
 so, apparently, had Mrs. Knox, judging by the 
 ease with which she straightened Casey's devious 
 narrative at critical points, and shepherded him 
 to his facts, like a cunning old collie steering a 
 sheep to its pen. The conclusion of the matter 
 was that Goggin was, on the morrow, to take 
 possession of Casey's remaining stock, consisting 
 of three calves, a donkey, and a couple of goats, in 
 liquidation of a debt of ^15, and that he, Stephen 
 Casey, knew that Mrs. Knox would never be 
 satisfied to see one of her own tenants wronged. 
 
 *' I have no tenants," replied Mrs. Knox tartly ; 
 **the Government is your landlord now, and I 
 wish you joy of each other ! " 
 
 " Then I wish to God it was yourself we had 
 31 
 
hi Mr. Knoxs Country 
 
 in it again!" lamented Stephen Casey; "it was 
 better for us when the gentry was managing 
 their own business. They'd give patience, and 
 they'd have patience." 
 
 ** Well, that will do now," said Mrs. Knox ; " go 
 round to the servants' hall and have your tea. 
 rU see what I can do." 
 
 There was silence while Stephen Casey with- 
 drew. As the sound of his hobnailed tread died 
 away the woolly dog advanced very stiffly to the 
 hall door, and, with his eyes fixed on the depart- 
 ing visitor, licked his lips hungrily. 
 
 "«* When those rascals in Parliament took our 
 land from us," said Mrs. Knox, flinging a sod of 
 turf on to the huge fire with practised aim, ''we 
 thought we should have some peace, now we're 
 both beggared and bothered ! " She turned upon 
 me a countenance like that of an ancient and spec- 
 tacled falcon. - Major Yeates! You have often 
 offered me a drive in your motor-car. Will you 
 take me to Killoge to-morrow morning ? " ^ 
 
 It was a brisk and windy morning, with the 
 sharpness of 9 a.m. in it, when Mullins, Mrs. 
 Knox's tirewoman, met me at the hall door of 
 Aussolas with her arms full of shawls, and a 
 countenance dark with doom and wrath. She 
 informed me that it was a shame for me to be 
 enticing the Mistress out of her bed at this hour 
 
 32 
 
The Finger of Mrs, Knox 
 
 of the morning, and that she would get her death 
 out of it. I was repudiating this soft impeach- 
 ment (which had indeed some flavour of the 
 Restoration drama about it), when the companion 
 of my flight appeared. 
 
 " How would anyone know the minute — " con- 
 tinued Mullins, addressing the universe, ** that this 
 what's-this-Tll-call-it wouldn't turn into a bog- 
 hole ? " She put this conundrum while fiercely 
 swaddling her mistress in cloak upon cloak. I 
 attempted no reply, and Mrs. Knox, winking both 
 eyes at me over the rim of the topmost shawl, 
 was hoisted into the back of the car ; as we 
 glided away I had, at all events, the consolation 
 of knowing that, in the event of an accident, 
 Mrs. Knox in her cloaks would float from the 
 car as softly and bulkily as a bumble bee. 
 
 As we ran out of the gates on to the high road 
 I remembered that my passenger's age was 
 variously reckoned at from ninety to a hundred, 
 and thought it well to ask her if fifteen miles an 
 hour would be too fast for pleasure. 
 
 ''You can't go too fast to please me," replied 
 Mrs. Knox, through the meshes of a Shetland 
 shawl. '* When I was a girl I rode a fourteen-hand 
 pony to the fourteenth milestone on the Cork 
 road in a minute under the hour ! I think you 
 should be able to double that ! " 
 
 33 c 
 
In Mr, Knoxs Country 
 
 I replied to this challenge with twenty miles an 
 hour, which, with a head wind and a bad road, I 
 considered to be fast enough for any old lady. 
 As a matter of fact it was too fast for her costume. 
 We had run some eight or nine miles before, 
 looking back, I noticed that a change of some 
 sort had occurred. 
 
 " Oh, the red one blew away long ago ! '* 
 screamed Mrs. Knox against the wind ; ** it doesn't 
 matter, I shall get it back — I'll ask Father Scanlan 
 to speak about it at Mass next Sunday. There's 
 a veil gone too — how frantic Mullins will be ! " 
 
 A skirl of laughter came from the recesses of 
 the remaining shawls. 
 
 We were running now on a level road under 
 the lee of a long line of hills ; a strip of plantation, 
 gay with the yellows and greens of autumn, clung 
 to a steep slope ahead of us, and, at the top of it, 
 some ragged pines looked like blots against the 
 sky. As we neared it, a faint and long-drawn 
 call came from the height ; presently among the 
 tree-trunks we saw hounds, like creatures in a 
 tapestry hunting scene, working up and up through 
 the brown undergrowth. I slackened speed. 
 
 *' Ton my honour, we've hit off the Hunt!" 
 exclaimed Mrs. Knox. 
 
 As she spoke there was a responsive yelp from 
 a tract of briars in the lower part of the wood ; 
 
 34 
 
The Finger of Mrs, Knox 
 
 two or three couples jostled downwards to their 
 comrade, and a full chorus, led by the soprano 
 squeals of the Hunt terrier, arose and streamed 
 along the wood above the road. I came to a 
 full stop, and, just in front of us, a rabbit emerged 
 very quietly from the fence of the wood, crept 
 along in the ditch, and disappeared in a hole in 
 the bank. The hounds still uttered the classic 
 paeans of the Chase ; hoofs clattered in a steep 
 lane on the hill-side, and Flurry Knox charged 
 on to the road a little ahead of us. 
 
 ** Forrad, forrad, forrad ! " he shouted as he 
 came. 
 
 "Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit!" cackled his grand- 
 mother at him in malevolent imitation. 
 
 I let the car go, and as we flew past him he 
 asked me, sideways out of a very red face, what 
 the devil I was doing there. It was evident that 
 Mrs. Knox's observation had been accepted in 
 the spirit in which it was offered. 
 
 " That will do my young gentleman no harm ! " 
 said Mrs. Knox complacently, as we became a 
 speck in the distance. 
 
 It was about ten o'clock when we ran down a 
 valley between steep hills to Killoge cross-roads. 
 The hill-sides were set thick with tree stumps, 
 like the crowded headstones of a cemetery, with 
 coarse grass and briars filling the spaces between 
 
 35 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 them. Here and there a slender, orphaned ash 
 sapling, spared because despised, stood among 
 the havoc, and showed with its handful of yellow 
 leaves what the autumn colours might once have 
 been here. A starkly new, cemented public- 
 house, with " J. Goggin " on the name board, stood 
 at the fork of the roads. Doubtless into it had 
 flowed the blood-money of the wood ; it repre- 
 sented the alternative offered to the community by 
 Mr. Goggin. I slowed up and looked about me. 
 
 ** I suppose this is — or was — Killoge Wood.*^" 
 I said to my passenger. 
 
 Mrs. Knox was staring through her spectacles 
 at the devastated hill-side. 
 
 " Ichabod, Ichabod ! " she murmured, and 
 leaned back in her place. 
 
 A man got up from a heap of stones by the 
 roadside and came slowly towards the car. 
 
 ** Well, Stephen," began Mrs. Knox irritably, 
 ** what about the cattle ? He looks as if he were 
 walking behind his own coffin ! " she continued in 
 a loud aside to me. 
 
 Stephen Casey removed his hat, and with it 
 indicated a group composed of three calves — and 
 nothing can look as dejected as an ill-fed, under- 
 bred calf — two goats, and a donkey, attended by 
 a boy with a stick, and a couple of cur dogs. 
 
 ** Himself and the sheriff's man is after driving 
 
 36 
 
'The Finger of Mrs, Knox 
 
 them, my lady," replied their proprietor, and 
 proceeded to envelop the name of Goggin in a 
 flowing mantle of curses. 
 
 " There, that will do for the present," said Mrs. 
 Knox peremptorily, as Casey, with tears stream- 
 ing down his face, paused to catch his wind. 
 *' Where's Goggin ? " 
 
 ''The two of them is inside in the shop," 
 answered the miserable Casey, still weeping copi- 
 ously. 
 
 I drove over to the public-house, thinking that 
 if Casey could not put up a better fight than this 
 it would be difficult to do much for him. The 
 door of the pub was already filled by the large 
 and decent figure of Mr. Goggin, who advanced 
 to meet us, taking off his hat reverentially ; I 
 remembered at once his pale and pimpled face, 
 his pink nose, his shabby grey and yellow beard. 
 He had been before me in a matter of selling 
 drink on Sunday, and had sailed out of court in 
 stainless triumph, on sworn evidence that he was 
 merely extending hospitality to some friends that 
 had come to make a match for a niece of his own, 
 and were tired after walking the land and putting 
 a price on the cattle. 
 
 ** Well, Goggin," said Mrs. Knox, waving to- 
 wards the hill-side a tiny hand in a mouldy old 
 black kid glove, " you've done a great work here ! 
 
 37 
 
In Mr, Knoxs Country 
 
 You've destroyed in six months what it took the 
 Colonel and the Lord Almighty eighty years to 
 make. That's something to be proud of! " 
 
 Goggin, again, and with even deeper reverence, 
 removed his hat, and murmured something about 
 being a poor man. 
 
 ** It was your own grandfather that planted 
 those trees for the Colonel," continued Mrs. Knox, 
 diving, as it were, into an ancient armoury and 
 snatching a rusty weapon from the wall. 
 
 ** That's the case, ma'am," replied Mr. Goggin 
 solemnly. '* The Lord have mercy on his soul ! " 
 
 ** You'll be wanting mercy on your own soul 
 in the next world, if you meet the Colonel there ! " 
 said Mrs. Knox unhesitatingly. 
 
 "I mightn't have the honour of meeting the 
 Colonel there, ma'am ! " tittered Goggin syco- 
 phantically. 
 
 "You might not indeed," responded Mrs. 
 Knox, '* but you might find your grandfather 
 making up a good fire for you with the logs out 
 of Killoge Wood ! " 
 
 "Ha, ha! That's good, faith!" said a fat 
 voice from the porter-flavoured depths of the 
 pub. I recognised among other half-seen faces 
 the round cheeks and bristling moustache of little 
 M 'Sweeny, the sheriffs officer, at Goggin's elbow. 
 
 *• And what's this I hear about Stephen 
 
 38 
 
TChe Finger of Mrs, Knox 
 
 Casey?" went on Mrs. Knox, in shrill and 
 trenchant tones, delivering her real attack now 
 that she had breached the wall. ** You lent him 
 five pounds two years ago, and now you're driv- 
 ing all his stock off! What do you call that, I'd 
 thank you to tell me ? " 
 
 In the discussion that followed I could almost 
 have been sorry for Goggin, so entirely over- 
 weighted was he by Mrs. Knox's traditional 
 prestige, by my official position, by knowledge of 
 the unseen audience in the pub, and by the 
 inherent rottenness of his case. Nevertheless, 
 the defence put forward by him was a very 
 creditable work of art. The whole affair had its 
 foundation in a foolish philanthropy, the outcome 
 of generous instincts exploited to their utmost, 
 only, indeed, kept within bounds by Mr. Goggin's 
 own financial embarrassments. These he prim- 
 arily referred back to the excessive price extorted 
 from him by Mrs. Knox's agent for the purchase 
 of his land under the Act ; and secondarily to the 
 bad debts with which Stephen Casey and other 
 customers had loaded him in their dealings with 
 his little shop. There were moments when I 
 almost had to accept Mr. Goggin's point of view, 
 so well-ordered and so mildly stated were his 
 facts. But Mrs. Knox's convictions were beyond 
 and above any possibility of being shaken by 
 
 39 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 mere evidence ; she has often said to me that if all 
 justice magistrates were deaf there would be more 
 done. She herself was not in the least deaf, but 
 she knew Mr. Goggin, which did as well. 
 
 ** Fifteen pounds worth of stock to pay a debt 
 that was never more than £y ! What do you 
 call that, Major Yeates ? " 
 
 She darted the question at me. 
 
 I had, some little time before, felt my last 
 moment of sympathy with Goggin expire, and I 
 replied with considerable heat that, if Mrs. Knox 
 would forgive my saying so, I called it damned 
 usury. 
 
 From this point the Affaire Casey went out 
 swiftly on an ebb tide. It was insinuated by 
 someone, M 'Sweeny, I think, that an instalment 
 of five pounds might be accepted, and the eyes of 
 Goggin turned, tentatively, to Mrs. Knox. It 
 has always been said of that venerable warrior 
 that if there were a job to be done for a friend 
 she would work her fingers to the bone, but she 
 would never put them in her pocket. I observed 
 that the eye of Goggin, having failed in its quest 
 of hers, was concentrating itself upon me. The 
 two walls of a corner seemed to rise mysteriously 
 on either side of me ; I suddenly, and without 
 premeditation, found myself promising to be re- 
 sponsible for the five pounds. 
 
 40 
 
The Finger of Mrs, Knox 
 
 Before the glow of this impulse had time to be 
 succeeded by its too familiar reaction, the broken, 
 yet persistent cry of hounds came to my ear. It 
 advanced swiftly, coming, seemingly, from higher 
 levels, into the desolated spaces that had once 
 been Killoge Wood. From the inner depths of 
 Mrs. Knox's wrappings the face of the woolly dog 
 amazingly presented itself; from the companion 
 depths of the public-house an equally unexpected 
 party of convives burst forth and stood at gaze. 
 Mrs. Knox tried to stand up, was borne down by 
 the sheer weight of rugs and the woolly dog, glared 
 at me for a tense moment, and hissed, " They're 
 coming this way ! Try to get a view ! " 
 
 Before the words had passed her lips someone 
 in the group at the door vociferated, ** Look at 
 him above ! Look at him ! " 
 
 I looked " above," but could see nothing. Not 
 so the rest of the group. 
 
 ** Now ! look at him going west the rock ! 
 Now ! He's passing the little holly-tree — he's 
 over the fence " 
 
 I bore, as I have so often borne, the exaspera- 
 tion of, as it were, hearing instead of seeing a 
 cinematograph, but I saw no reason why I should 
 submit to the presence of Mr. M 'Sweeny, who 
 had sociably sprung into the motor beside me 
 in order to obtain a better view. 
 
 41 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 " Look at him over the wall ! " howled the 
 cinematograph. " Look at the size he is ! Isn't 
 he the divil of a sheep ! " 
 
 It was at this moment that I first caught sight 
 of the fox, about fifty yards on the farther side of 
 Casey's assortment of live stock and their guar- 
 dian cur dogs, gliding over the wall like a cat, 
 and slipping away up the road. At this point 
 Mr. M*Sweeny, finding the disadvantage of his 
 want of stature, bounded on to the seat beside 
 me and uttered a long yell. 
 
 "Hi! Athim! Tiger, good dog! Hi! Rosy!" 
 
 I cannot now say whether I smote M'Sweeny 
 in the legs before he jumped, or if I merely accele- 
 rated the act ; he appeared to be running before 
 he touched the ground, and he probably took it 
 as a send-ofT, administered in irrepressible fellow- 
 feeling. 
 
 Tiger and Rosy were already laying them- 
 selves out down the road, and their yelps streamed 
 back from them like the sparks from an engine. 
 The party at the door was suddenly in full flight 
 after them with a swiftness and unanimity that 
 again recalled the cinematograph. They caught 
 away with them Stephen Casey and his animals ; 
 and I had an enlivening glimpse of the donkey at 
 the top of the hunt, braying as it went ; of Goggin 
 trying in vain to stem the companion flight 
 
 42 
 
The Finger of Mrs, Knox 
 
 of the calves. The bend of the road hid them 
 all from us ; the thumping of heavy feet, the 
 sobbing bray of the donkey, passed rapidly into 
 remoteness, and Mrs. Knox and I were left with 
 nothing remaining to us of the situation save the 
 well-defined footmarks of M 'Sweeny on the seat 
 beside me (indelible, as I afterwards discovered). 
 
 *'Get on, Major Yeates!" screamed Mrs. Knox, 
 above the barking of the woolly dog. " We must 
 see it out ! " 
 
 I started the car, and just before we in our 
 turn rounded the corner I looked back, and saw 
 the leading hounds coming down the hill-side. I 
 slackened and saw them drop into the road and 
 there remain, mystified, no doubt, by the astonish- 
 ing variety of scents, from goat to gombeen man, 
 that presented themselves. Of Flurry and his 
 followers there was no sign. 
 
 *' Get on, get on," reiterated Mrs. Knox, divin- 
 ing, no doubt, my feelings ; " we shall do no more 
 harm than the rest ! " 
 
 I gave the car her head, knowing that what- 
 ever I did Flurry would have my blood. In less 
 than two minutes we were all but into Stephen 
 Casey's goats, who, being yoked together in body 
 but not in spirit, required the full width of the 
 road for their argument. We passed Stephen 
 Casey and the gombeen man cornering the 
 
 43 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 disputed calves in the sympathetic accord that 
 such an operation demands. As we neared 
 M 'Sweeny, who brought up the rear, the body 
 of the hunt, still headed by the donkey, swept 
 into a field on the left of the road. The fox, as 
 might have been expected, had passed from the 
 ken of the cur dogs, and these, intoxicated by 
 the incitements of their owners, now flung them- 
 selves, with the adaptability of their kind, into the 
 pursuit of the donkey. 
 
 I stopped and looked back. The leading 
 hounds were galloping behind the car ; I recog- 
 nised at their heads Rattler and Roman, the 
 puppies I had walked, and for a moment was 
 touched by this mark of affection. The gratifi- 
 cation was brief. They passed me without a 
 glance, and with anticipatory cries of joy flung 
 themselves into the field and joined in the chase 
 of the donkey. 
 
 "They'll kill him!" exclaimed Mrs. Knox, 
 restraining with difficulty the woolly dog ; ** what 
 good is Flurry that he can't keep with his 
 hounds ! " 
 
 Galloping hoofs on the road behind us clattered 
 a reply, accompanied by what I can only describe 
 as imprecations on the horn, and Flurry hurtled 
 by and swung his horse into the field over a low 
 bank with all the dramatic fury of the hero rush- 
 
 44 
 
The Finger of Mrs, Knox 
 
 ing to the rescue of the leading lady. It recalled 
 the incidents that in the palmy days of the Hip- 
 podrome gloriously ended in a plunge into deep 
 water, amid a salvo of firearms. 
 
 In Flurry's wake came the rest of the pack, 
 and with them Dr. Jerome Hickey. " A great 
 morning's cubbing ! " he called out, snatching off 
 his old velvet cap. " Thirty minutes with an 
 old fox, and now a nice burst with a jackass ! " 
 
 For the next three or four minutes shrieks, 
 like nothing so much as forked lightning, lacer- 
 ated the air, as the guilty hounds began to 
 receive that which was their due. It seemed 
 possible that my turn would come next ; I looked 
 about to see what the chances were of turning 
 the car and withdrawing as soon as might be, 
 dnd decided to move on down the road in search 
 of facilities. We had proceeded perhaps a hun- 
 dred yards without improving the situation, when 
 my eye was caught by something moving swiftly 
 through the furze-bushes that clothed a little hill 
 on the right of the road. It was brownish red, 
 it slid into the deep furze that crested the hill, 
 and was gone. 
 
 Here was a heaven-sent peace-offering! 
 
 ** Tally-ho ! " I bellowed, rising in my place and 
 waving my cap high in air. ** Tally-ho, over ! " 
 
 The forked lightning ceased. 
 45 
 
In Mr. Knoxs Country 
 
 ** What way is he ? " came an answering bellow 
 from Flurry. 
 
 ** This way, over the hill ! '* 
 
 The hounds were already coming to the holloa. 
 I achieved some very creditable falsetto screeches; 
 I leaped from the car, and cheered and capped 
 them over the fence ; I shouted precise directions 
 to the Master and Whip, who were now, with the 
 clamours proper to their calling, steeplechasing 
 into the road and out of it again, followed by two 
 or three of the Field, including the new District 
 Inspector of the Royal Irish Constabulary (re- 
 cently come from Meath with a high reputation 
 as a goer). They scrambled and struggled up 
 the hill-side, through rocks and furze (in connec- 
 tion with which I heard the new D.I. making 
 some strenuous comments to his Meath hunter), 
 the hounds streamed and screamed over the 
 ridge of the hill, the riders shoved their puffing 
 horses after them, topped it, and dropped behind 
 it. The furzy skyline and the pleasant blue and 
 white sky above it remained serene and silent. 
 
 I returned to the car, and my passenger, who, 
 as I now realised, had remained very still during 
 these excitements. 
 
 " That was a bit of luck ! " I said happily, 
 inflated by the sense of personal merit that is the 
 portion of one who has viewed a fox away. As I 
 spoke I became aware of something fixed in Mrs. 
 
 46 
 
"The Finger of Mrs, Knox 
 
 Knox's expression, something rigid, as though she 
 were repressing emotion ; a fear flashed through 
 my mind that she was overtired, and that the cry 
 of the hounds had brought back to her the days 
 when she too had known what a first burst away 
 with a fox out of Killoge Wood had felt Hke. 
 
 ** Major Yeates," she said sepulchrally, and yet 
 with some inward thrill in her voice, *' I think the 
 sooner we start for home the better." 
 
 I could not turn the car, but, rather than lose 
 time, I ran it backwards towards the cross-roads ; 
 it was a branch of the art in which I had not 
 become proficient, and as, with my head over my 
 shoulder, I dodged the ditches, I found myself 
 continually encountering Mrs. Knox's eye, and 
 was startled by something in it that was both 
 jubilant and compassionate. I also surprised her 
 in the act of wiping her eyes. I wondered if she 
 were becoming hysterical, and yearned for Mullins 
 as the policeman (no doubt) yearns for the mother 
 of the lost child. 
 
 On the road near the public-house we came 
 upon M 'Sweeny, Goggin, and Casey, obviously 
 awaiting us. 1 stopped the car, not without re- 
 luctance. 
 
 "That will be all right, Goggin," said Mrs. 
 Knox airily ; " we're in a hurry to get home now." 
 
 The three protagonists looked at one another 
 dubiously, and simultaneously cleared their throats. 
 
 47 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 " I beg your pardon, Mrs. Knox, ma am," 
 began Mr. Goggin very delicately. " Mr 
 M 'Sweeny would be thankful to speak a word to 
 you before you go." 
 
 ** Well, let him speak and be quick about it," 
 returned Mrs. Knox, who seemed to have re- 
 covered remarkably from her moment of emotion. 
 
 ** You must excuse me, Major Yeates," said 
 Mr. M'Sweeny, chivalrously selecting me as the 
 person to whom to present the business end of 
 the transaction, "but I'm afraid I must trouble 
 you about that little matter of the five pounds 
 that we arranged a while ago — I couldn't go 
 back without it was settled " 
 
 Mr. Goggin coughed, and looked at his boots ; 
 Stephen Casey sighed heavily. 
 
 At the same moment I thought I heard the 
 horn. 
 
 '* I'm afraid I haven't got it with me," I said, 
 pulling out a handful of silver and a half-sovereign. 
 ** I suppose eighteen and sixpence wouldn't be 
 any use to you } " 
 
 Mr. M 'Sweeny smiled deprecatingly, as at a 
 passing jest, and again I heard the horn, several 
 harsh and prolonged notes. 
 
 Mrs. Knox leaned forward and poked me in 
 the back with some violence. 
 
 ''Goggin will lend it to you," she said, with 
 the splendid simplicity of a great mind. 
 
 48 
 
"I heard scald-crow laughter behind me in the shawls." 
 
T^he Finger of Mrs, Knox 
 
 It must be recorded of Goggin that he accepted 
 this singular inversion of the position Hke a 
 gentleman. We moved on to his house and he 
 went in with an excellent show of alacrity to fetch 
 the money wherewith I was to stop his own 
 mouth. It was while we were waiting that a small 
 wet collie, reddish-brown in colour, came flying 
 across the road, and darted in at the open door 
 of the house. Its tongue was hanging out, it 
 was panting heavily. 
 
 " I seen her going over the hill, and the hounds 
 after her ; I thought she wouldn't go three 
 sthretches before they'd have her cot," said 
 M 'Sweeny pleasantly. " But I declare she gave 
 them a nice chase. When she seen the Doctor 
 beating the hounds, that's the time she ran." 
 
 I turned feebly in my place and looked at 
 Mrs. Knox. 
 
 ** It was a very natural mistake," she said, 
 again wiping her eyes ; " I myself was taken in 
 for a moment — but only for a moment ! " she 
 added, with abominable glee. 
 
 I gave her but one glance, laden with reproach, 
 and turned to M'Sweeny. 
 
 •* You'll get the five pounds from Goggin," I 
 said, starting the car. 
 
 As we ran out of Killoge, at something near 
 thirty miles an hour, I heard scald-crow laughter 
 behind me in the shawls. 
 
 49 l> 
 
Ill 
 
 THE FRIEND OF HER YOUTH 
 
 It has come to this with me, I am not the 
 country-house visitor that I once was. It is a 
 sign of age, I suppose, and of growing unamia- 
 bility ; so, at any rate, my wife tells me. For 
 my part, I think it indicates a power of discrimi- 
 nating between the things that are good enough, 
 and the infinitely more numerous things that are 
 the reverse. 
 
 ** Do you mean to say this isn't good enough ? " 
 said Philippa, putting down the novel that, at 
 II A.M., she was shamelessly reading, and indi- 
 cating our surroundings with a swing of her open 
 parasol. 
 
 It was a perfect morning in August. She and 
 I were seated in incredible leisure, in comfortable 
 basket chairs, on a space of sward that sank in 
 pleasant curves to the verge of the summer sea. 
 We looked across three miles of burnished water 
 to the Castle Manus hills, that showed mistily 
 through grey veils of heat ; in the middle distance 
 a 40-ton cutter yacht drowsed at anchor ; at the 
 end of the sward a strand, theatrical in the perfec- 
 
 50 
 
T^he Friend of Her Touth 
 
 tion of its pale sand and dark rocks, laid itself 
 out to attract the bather. 
 
 ** I think it is very good," I replied, " but it 
 won't last. At any minute old Derryclare will 
 come and compel me to go out trawling, or mend- 
 ing nets, or cutting up bait, or mucking out the 
 dinghey " 
 
 ** You may be thankful if he lets you off with 
 that!" said Philippa, flitting from her first posi- 
 tion and taking up one in advance of mine. 
 
 Following the direction of her eyes, I perceived, 
 as it were at the back of the stage, two mysteri- 
 ous, shrouded figures pursuing a swift course to- 
 wards the house through a shrubbery of immense 
 hydrangea bushes. Their heads resembled mon- 
 ster black door-handles, round their shoulders 
 hung flounces of black muslin ; in gauntleted 
 hands they bore trays loaded with "sections" of 
 honey ; even at a distance of fifty yards we could 
 see their attendant cortdge of indignant bees. 
 
 " Taken thirty pounds this morning ! " shouted 
 the leading door-handle, speeding towards the 
 house. " Splendid heather honey ! " 
 
 "You ought to show some interest," said my wife 
 malignly. "Go in and look at it. He's your host!" 
 
 **Not if he were all the hosts of Midian!" I 
 said, but I felt shaken. 
 
 I rose from my chair. 
 
 51 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 ** I'm going to the motor-house," I said firmly. 
 
 ** Very well, I shall bathe," replied Philippa. 
 
 ** I suppose you are aware that your old friend, 
 Mr. Chichester, is at present in possession of the 
 bathing cove," I returned, ** and it might be as 
 well to ascertain the opinion of your hostess on 
 the subject of mixed bathing." 
 
 ** Did you observe that Lord Derryclare was 
 wearing your new motor-gloves } " said Philippa 
 as I moved away. 
 
 I magnanimously left the last word with her. 
 
 The Derryclares were in the habit of hurling 
 themselves, at intervals, out of civilisation, and 
 into the wilderness, with much the same zest with 
 which those who live in the wilderness hurl them- 
 selves into civilisation. In the wilderness, twenty 
 miles from a railway station, they had built them 
 a nest, and there led that variety of the simple 
 life that is founded on good servants, old clothes, 
 and a total indifference to weather. Wandering 
 friends on motor tours swooped occasionally out 
 of space; married daughters, with intervals 
 between visits to be filled in, arrived without 
 warning, towing reluctant husbands (who had 
 been there before). Lost men, implicated with 
 Royal Commissions and Congested Districts, 
 were washed in at intervals ; Lady Derryclare 
 said she never asked anyone ; people came. 
 
 52 
 
The Friend of Her Youth 
 
 It is true that she had asked us, but the invita- 
 tion had been given on our wedding-day, and 
 had been put away with our duplicate wedding 
 presents ; we had now disinterred it, because I 
 had bought a motor, and was still in the stage of 
 enthusiasm when the amateur driver will beat up 
 visits for his wife to pay. I do not know how 
 Chichester got there ; he, like Lady Derryclare, 
 dated from the benighted period before Philippa 
 knew me, and I may admit that, in common with 
 most husbands, I am not attracted by the male 
 friends of my wife's youth. If Chichester had 
 been the type she fancied, was I merely a Super- 
 Chichester ? 
 
 Chichester was an elderly young man, worn 
 smooth by much visiting in country houses, and 
 thoroughly competent in the avocations proper to 
 his career. He knew the best ** stands " at half 
 the shoots in Ireland, and could tell to half a 
 crown the value set upon each by the keeper ; 
 if you gave him a map he could put a pudgy 
 finger upon the good cooks as promptly as an 
 archbishop upon his cathedral towns ; he played 
 a useful and remunerative game of bridge ; to see 
 his eye, critical, yet alight with healthful voracity, 
 travelling down the array of dishes on the side- 
 table at breakfast, and arranging unhesitatingly 
 the order in which they were to be attacked, was 
 
 S3 
 
In Mr, Knoxs Country 
 
 a lesson to the heedless who blunt the fine edge 
 of appetite with porridge. 
 
 He faced me at lunch, plump and pink and 
 shining after his bathe ; he was clean-shaved (the 
 only reliable remedy for a greying moustache, as 
 I did not fail to point out to Philippa) ; it in- 
 creased his resemblance to a well-fed and passe 
 schoolboy. Old Derryclare, whose foible it was 
 to believe that he never had any luncheon, was 
 standing at the sideboard, devouring informally 
 a slice of bread and honey. One of his eyes was 
 bunged up by bee-stings, and the end of his large 
 nose shone red from the same cause. 
 
 "Bill," he said, addressing his eldest son, 
 "don't you forget to take those sections on board 
 this afternoon." 
 
 " No fear ! " responded Bill, helping himself to 
 a beaker of barley-water with hands that bore 
 indelible traces of tar and motor grease. 
 
 Bill was a vigorous youth, of the type that I 
 have heard my friend Slipper describe as "a 
 hardy young splinter " ; he was supposed to be 
 preparing for a diplomatic career, and in the 
 meantime was apparently qualifying for the 
 engine-room of a tramp steamer (of which, it may 
 be added, his father would have made a most 
 admirable skipper). 
 
 " Great stuff, honey, with a rice-pudding," 
 54 
 
The Friend of Her Youth 
 
 went on Bill. " Mrs. Yeates, do you know I can 
 make a topping rice-pudding ? " 
 
 I noticed that Chichester, who was seated next 
 to Philippa, suddenly ceased to chew. 
 
 •* I can do you a very high-class omelette, too," 
 continued Bill, bashing a brutal spoon into the 
 fragile elegance of something that looked as if 
 it were made of snow and spun glass. ** I'm not 
 so certain about my mutton-chops and beefsteak, 
 but I've had the knives sharpened, anyhow!" 
 
 Chichester turned his head away, as from a 
 jest too clownish to be worthy of attention. His 
 cheek was large, and had a tender, beefy flush 
 in it. 
 
 ** In my house," he said to Philippa, " I never 
 allow the knives to be sharpened. If meat re- 
 quires a sharp knife it is not fit to eat." 
 
 '* No, of course not ! " replied Philippa, with 
 nauseating hypocrisy. 
 
 " The principle on which my wife buys meat," 
 I said to the table at large, *' is to say to the 
 butcher, * I want the best meat in your shop ; but 
 don't show it to me ! ' " 
 
 " Mrs. Yeates is quite right," said Chichester 
 seriously ; ^' you should be able to trust your 
 butcher." 
 
 The door flew open, and La'dy Derryclare strode 
 in, wrestling as she came with the strings of a 
 
 55 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 painting apron, whose office had been no sinecure. 
 She was tall and grey-haired, and was just suffi- 
 ciently engrossed in her own pursuits to be an 
 attractive hostess. 
 
 ** It was perfectly lovely out there on the 
 Sheila,'' she said, handing the apron to the butler, 
 who removed it from the room with respectful 
 disapproval. *' If only she hadn't swung with the 
 tide ! I found my sketch had more and more in 
 it every moment — turning into a panorama, in 
 fact ! Yachts would be perfect if they had long 
 solid legs and stood on concrete." 
 
 I said that I thought a small island would do 
 as well. 
 
 Lady Derryclare disputed this, and argued 
 that an island would involve a garden, whereas 
 the charm of a yacht was that one hideous bunch 
 of flowers on the cabin table was all that was 
 expected of it, and that kind people ashore always 
 gave it vegetables. 
 
 I said that these things did not concern me, as 
 I usually neither opened my eyes or touched food 
 while yachting. I said this very firmly, being 
 not without fear that I might yet find myself 
 hustled into becoming one of the party that was 
 to go aboard the Sheila that very night. They 
 were to start on the top of the tide, that is to 
 say, at 4 a.m. the following morning, to sail 
 
 56 
 
The Friend of Her Youth 
 
 round the coast to a bay some thirty miles away, 
 renowned for its pollack-fishing, and there to 
 fish. Pollack-fishing, as a sport, does not appeal 
 to me ; according to my experience, it consists in 
 hauling up coarse fish out of deep water by 
 means of a hook baited with red flannel. It 
 might appear poor-spirited, even effeminate, but 
 nothing short of a press-gang should get me 
 on board the Sheila that night. 
 
 *' Every expedition requires its martyr," said 
 Lady Derryclare, helping herself to some of the 
 best cold salmon it has been my lot to encounter, 
 ** it makes it so much pleasanter for the others ; 
 some one they can despise and say funny things 
 about." 
 
 "The situation may produce its martyr," I 
 said. 
 
 Lady Derryclare glanced quickly at me, and 
 then at Chichester, who was now expounding to 
 Philippa the method, peculiar to himself, by 
 which he secured mountain mutton of the essen- 
 tial age. 
 
 At nine-thirty that night I sat with my hostess 
 and my wife, engaged in a domestic game of 
 Poker-patience. Shaded lights and a softly 
 burning turf fire shed a mellow radiance ; an ex- 
 quisite completeness was added by a silken rustle 
 of misty rain against the south window. 
 
 57 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 ** Do you think they'll start in this weather ? " 
 said Philippa sympathetically. 
 
 ** Seventy-five, and one full house, ten, that's 
 eighty-five," said Lady Derryclare abstractedly. 
 *' Start? you may be quite sure they'll start! 
 Then we three shall have an empty house. That 
 ought to count at least twenty ! " 
 
 Lady Derryclare was far too good a hostess 
 not to appreciate the charms of solitude ; that 
 Philippa and I should be looked upon as solitude 
 was soothing to the heart of the guest, the heart 
 that, however good the hostess, inevitably con- 
 ceals some measure of apprehension. 
 
 *' Has Mr. Chichester been on board the 
 Sheila? '' I enquired, with elaborate unconcern. 
 
 ''Never!'' said Lady Derryclare melodramati- 
 cally. 
 
 "I believe he has done some yachting?" I 
 continued. 
 
 ** A five-hundred-ton steam yacht to the West 
 Indies ! " replied Lady Derryclare. ** Bathrooms 
 and a chef- " 
 
 There was a thumping of heavy feet outside the 
 door, and the yacht party entered, headed by Lord 
 Derryclare with a lighted lantern. They were clad 
 in oilskins and sou'-westers ; Bill had a string of 
 onions in one hand and a sponge-bag in the other ; 
 Chichester carried a large gold-mounted umbrella. 
 
 58 
 
The Friend of Her Touth 
 
 ** You look as if you were acting a charade," 
 said Lady Derryclare, shuffling the cards for the 
 next game, the game that would take place when 
 the pleasure-seekers had gone forth into the rain. 
 ** The word is Fare-well, I understand ? " 
 
 It occurred to me that to fare well was the last 
 thing that Chichester was likely to do ; and, 
 furthermore, that the same thing had occurred 
 to him. 
 
 " * Fare thee well, my own Mary Anne ! ' " sang 
 Lord Derryclare, in a voice like a bassoon, and 
 much out of tune. ** It's a dirty night, but the 
 glass is rising, and " (here he relapsed again into 
 song) ** * We are bound for the sea, Mary Anne ! 
 We are bound for the sea ! ' " 
 
 **Then we're to meet you on Friday?" said 
 Philippa, addressing herself to Chichester in 
 palpable and egregious consolation. 
 
 " Dear lady," replied Chichester tartly, ** in the 
 South of Ireland it is quite absurd to make plans. 
 One is the plaything of the climate ! " 
 
 "All aboard," said Lord Derryclare, with a 
 swing of his lantern. 
 
 As they left the room the eye of Bill met mine, 
 not without understanding. 
 
 ** Now D's perfectly happy," remarked Lady 
 Derryclare, sorting her suits ; '* but I'm not quite 
 so sure about the Super-Cargo." 
 
 59 
 
In Mr. Knox's Comitry 
 
 The game progressed pleasantly, and we heard 
 the rain enwrap the house softly, as with a 
 mantle. 
 
 The next three days were spent in inglorious 
 peace, not to say sloth. On one of them, which 
 was wet, I cleared off outstanding letters and 
 browsed among new books and innumerable 
 magazines : on the others, which were fine, I ran 
 the ladies in the car back into the hills, and 
 pottered after grouse with a venerable red setter, 
 while Lady Derryclare painted, and Philippa 
 made tea. When not otherwise employed, I 
 thanked heaven that I was not on board the 
 Sheila, 
 
 On Thursday night came a telegram from the 
 yacht : 
 
 ** Ronnie's flotilla in ; luncheon party to-morrow; 
 come early. — Bill." 
 
 At nine o'clock the next morning we were on 
 the road ; there was a light northerly breeze, 
 enough to dry the roads and to clear the sky of 
 all save a few silver feathers of cloud ; the heather 
 was in bloom on the hills, the bogs were bronze 
 and green, the mountains behind them were as 
 blue as grapes ; best of all, the car was running 
 like a saint, floating up the minor hills, pounding 
 
 60 
 
The Friend of Her Youth 
 
 unfalteringly up the big ones. She and I were 
 still in the honeymoon stage, and her most normal 
 virtues were to me miraculous ; even my two 
 ladies, though, like their sex, grossly utilitarian, 
 and incapable, as I did not fail to assure them, 
 of appreciating the poesy of mechanism, were 
 complimentary. 
 
 In that part of Ireland in which my lot is cast 
 signposts do not exist. The residents, very 
 reasonably, consider them to be superfluous, even 
 ridiculous, in view of the fact that every one 
 knows the way, and as for strangers, " haven't 
 they tongues in their heads as well as another ? " 
 It all tends to conversation and an increased 
 knowledge of human nature. Therefore it was 
 that when we had descended from the hills, and 
 found ourselves near the head of Dunerris Bay, 
 at a junction of three roads, any one of which 
 might have been ours, our only course was to 
 pause there and await enlightenment. 
 
 It came, plentifully, borne by an outside car, 
 and bestowed by no less than four beautifully 
 dressed young ladies. I alighted and approached 
 the outside car, and was instructed by the driver 
 as to the route, an intricate one, to Eyries Harbour. 
 The young ladies offered supplementary sugges- 
 tions ; they were mysteriously acquainted with 
 the fact that the Sheila was our destination, and 
 
 6i 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 were also authorities on the movements of that 
 section of the British Navy that was known to 
 the family of Sub-Lieutenant the Hon. Ronald 
 Cunningham as ** Ronnie's Flotilla." 
 
 ** We met the yacht gentlemen at tea on Mr. 
 Cunningham's torpedo-boat yesterday afternoon," 
 volunteered the prettiest of the young ladies, with 
 a droop of her eyelashes. 
 
 The party then laughed, and looked at each 
 other, as those do who have together heard the 
 chimes at midnight. 
 
 "Why, we're going to lunch with them to-day 
 at the hotel at Ecclestown ! And with you, too ! " 
 broke in another, with a sudden squeal of laughter. 
 
 I said that the prospect left nothing to be 
 desired. 
 
 ** Mr. Chichester invited us yesterday!" put in 
 a third from the other side of the car. 
 
 '* I don't think it's pollack he'll order for 
 luncheon," said the fourth of the party from under 
 the driver's elbow, a flapper, with a slow, hoarse 
 voice, and a heavy cold in her head. 
 
 '* Shut up, Katty, you brat ! " said the eldest, 
 with lightning utterance. 
 
 The quartette again dissolved into laughter. 
 I said ** Au revoir," and withdrew to report 
 progress to my deeply interested passengers. 
 
 As the outside car disappeared from view at a 
 62 
 
l^he Friend of Her Touth 
 
 corner, the Flapper waved a large pocket-hand- 
 kerchief to me. 
 
 " You seem to have done wonderfully well in 
 the time," said Lady Derryclare kindly. 
 
 For half an hour or more we ran west along 
 the southern shore of the great bay ; Ecclestown, 
 where Chichester's luncheon-party was to take 
 place, was faintly visible on the further side. So 
 sparkling was the sea, so benign the breeze, that 
 even I looked forward without anxiety, almost 
 with enjoyment, to the sail across the bay. 
 
 There is a bland and peaceful suggestion about 
 the word village that is wholly inapplicable to the 
 village of Eyries, a collection of dismal, slated 
 cabins, grouped round a public-house, like a 
 company of shabby little hens round a shabby 
 and bedraggled cock. The road that had con- 
 veyed us to this place of entertainment committed 
 suicide on a weedy beach below, its last moments 
 much embittered by chaotic heaps of timber, 
 stones, and gravel. A paternal Board was build- 
 ing a pier, and ''mountains of gold was flying 
 into it, but the divil a much would ever come 
 out of it." 
 
 This I was told by the publican as I bestowed 
 the car in an outhouse in his yard, wherein, 
 he assured me, " neither chick nor child would 
 find it." 
 
 63 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 The Sheila was anchored near the mouth of the 
 harbour ; there was a cheerful air of expectancy 
 about her, and her big mainsail was hoisted ; her 
 punt, propelled by Bill, was already tripping to- 
 wards us over the little waves ; the air was salt, 
 and clean, and appetising. Bill appeared to be 
 in robust health ; he had taken on a good many 
 extra tones of sunburn, and it was difficult, on a 
 cursory inspection, to decide where his neck ended 
 and his brown flannel shirt began. 
 
 ** Oh, a topping time ! " he said, as we 
 
 moved out over the green, clear water, through 
 which glimmered to us the broken pots and pans 
 of Eyries that lay below. " Any amount of fish 
 going. We've had to give away no end." 
 
 *' I should like to hear what you've been giving 
 Mr. Chichester to eat?" said Lady Derryclare 
 suavely. 
 
 "Well, there was the leg of mutton that we 
 took with us ; he ate that pretty well ; and a sort 
 of a hash next day, fair to middling." 
 
 " And after that ? " said his mother, with polite 
 interest. 
 
 "Well, after that," said Bill, leaning his elbows 
 on his sculls and ticking off the items on his 
 fingers, " we had boiled pollack, and fried pollack, 
 and pollack rdchauffd aux fines herbes — onions, 
 
 you know " 
 
 64 
 
I'he Friend of Her Touth 
 
 Bill broke off artistically, and I recalled to 
 myself a saying of an American sage, " Those 
 that go down to the sea in ships see the works 
 of the Lord, but those that go down to the sea 
 in cutters see hell." 
 
 ** He went ashore yesterday," said Bill, re- 
 suming his narrative and the sculls, *'and came 
 aboard with a pig's face and a pot of jam that he 
 got at the pub, and I say! — that pig's face! — 
 Phew ! My aunt ! " 
 
 " * Look in my face ; my name is Might-have- 
 been,' " quoted Lady Derryclare. 
 
 Philippa shuddered aloud. 
 
 *' But he's going to come level to-day," went on 
 Bill; "he's standing us all lunch at the Eccles- 
 town Hotel, Ronnie's skipper and all. He spent 
 a good half-hour writing out a menu, and Ronnie 
 took it over last night. We had tea on board 
 Ronnie's ship, you know." 
 
 We said we knew all about the tea-party and 
 the guests. 
 
 ** Oh, you do, do you?" said Bill; "then you 
 know a good deal! Chichester can tell you a 
 bit more about the dark one if you like to ask 
 him ! " 
 
 ** He seems to have outgrown his fancy for 
 fair people," I said. 
 
 Philippa put her nose in the air. 
 
 65 E 
 
/;; Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 ** He's gorgeously dressed for the occasion," 
 continued Bill. 
 
 ** More than you are ! " said his mother. 
 
 ** Oh, my one don't care. No more does 
 Ronnie's. What they enjoyed was the engine- 
 room." 
 
 ** It seems to me," said Lady Derryclare to 
 Philippa, " that we are rather superfluous to this 
 entertainment." 
 
 Chichester stood at the gangway and helped 
 the ladies on to the narrow, hog-backed deck of 
 the Sheila, He was indeed beautifully dressed, 
 but to the critical eye it seemed that the spotless 
 grey flannel suit hung a shade easier, and that the 
 line of his cheek was less freshly rounded. His 
 nose had warmed to a healthful scarlet, but his eye 
 was cold, and distinctly bleak. He was silent, 
 not, it was obvious to me, because he had nothing 
 to say, but because he might have more to say 
 than would be convenient. In all senses save 
 the literal one he suggested the simple phrase, 
 *'Fedup." I felt for him. As I saw the grim 
 deck-bosses on which we might have to sit, and 
 the dark mouth of the cabin in which we might 
 have to eat, and tripped over a rope, and grasped 
 at the boom, which yielded instead of supporting 
 me, I thought with a lover's ardour of the superi- 
 ority — whether as means of progression or as toy 
 
 66 
 
ne Friend of Her Touth 
 
 — of the little car, tucked away in the Eyries 
 publican's back-yard, where neither chick nor child 
 would find her. 
 
 **You ought to have come with us, Yeates," 
 said Derryclare, emerging from the companion- 
 hatch with a fishing-line in his hand. ''Great 
 sport ! we got a hundred and fifty yesterday — 
 beats trout-fishing ! Doesn't it, Chichester ? " 
 
 Chichester smiled sarcastically and looked at 
 his watch. 
 
 *' Quite right," said his lordship, twisting his 
 huge hairy paw, and consulting the nickel time- 
 keeper on his wrist. ** Time to be off — mustn't 
 keep our young ladies waiting. We'll slip across 
 in no time with this nice breeze. Regular ladies' 
 day. Now then. Bill! get that fores'l on her — 
 we'll up anchor and be off ! " 
 
 There are few places in creation where the 
 onlooker can find himself more painfully and 
 perpetually de trop than on the deck of a small 
 yacht. I followed the ladies to the saloon. 
 Chichester remained on deck. As I carefully 
 descended the companion-ladder I saw him look- 
 ing again at his watch, and from it across the bay 
 to the hazy white specks, some four miles away, 
 in one of which assiduous waiters were even now, 
 it might be, setting forth the repast that was to 
 indemnify him for three days of pollack. 
 
 67 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 " P'ff ; I wonder if they ever open the windows," 
 said Lady Derryclare, fitting herself skilfully 
 into the revolving chair at the end of the cabin 
 table. ** Do sit down — these starting operations 
 are always lengthy." 
 
 I took my seat, that is to say, I began to sit 
 down in the air, well outside the flap of the table, 
 and gradually inserted myself underneath it. 
 The bunch of flowers, foretold by Lady Derry- 
 clare, confronted us, packed suffocatingly into its 
 vase, and even the least astute of the party (I 
 allude to myself) was able unhesitatingly to place 
 it as an attention from the fair ones of the outside 
 car. Behind my shoulders, a species of trough 
 filled the interval between the back of the seat 
 and the sloping side of the yacht ; in it lay 
 old tweed caps, old sixpenny magazines, field- 
 glasses, cans of tobacco, and a well-worn box of 
 " Patience '' cards. Above and behind it a rack 
 made of netting was darkly charged with signal- 
 flags, fishing-rods, and minor offal. 
 
 ** Think of them all, smoking here on a wet 
 night," said Lady Derryclare with abhorrence ; 
 "with the windows shut and no shade on the 
 lamp ! Let nothing tempt any of you to open 
 the pantry door ; we might see the pig's face. 
 Unfortunate George Chichester!" 
 
 *' I shouldn't pity him too much," said L ** I 
 68 
 
The Friend of Her Youth 
 
 expect he wouldn't take five pounds for his 
 appetite this moment ! " 
 
 The rhythmic creak of the windlass told that 
 the anchor was coming up. It continued for 
 some moments, and then stopped abruptly. 
 
 " Now then, all together ! " said Lord Derry- 
 clare's voice. 
 
 A pause, punctuated by heavy grunts of effort 
 — then Bill's voice. 
 
 "What the blazes is holding it? Come on, 
 Chichester, and put your back into it ! " 
 
 Chichester's back, ample as it would seem, had 
 no appreciable effect on the situation. 
 
 "You ought to go and help them, Sinclair," 
 said my wife, with that readiness to offer a vicari- 
 ous sacrifice that is so characteristic of wives. 
 
 I said I would wait till I was asked. I had not 
 to wait long. 
 
 I took my turn at the warm handle-bar of the 
 windlass, and grunted and strove as strenuously 
 as my predecessors. The sun poured down in 
 undesired geniality, the mainsail lurched and 
 flapped ; the boom tugged at its tether ; the 
 water jabbered and gurgled past the bows. 
 
 "I think we're in the co7isommi!'' remarked 
 Bill, putting his hands in his pockets. 
 
 *' Here," said Lord Derryclare, with a very red 
 face ; " confound her ! we'll sail her off it ! " 
 
 69 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 Chichester sat down in a deck-chair as remote 
 as possible from his kind, and once again con- 
 sulted his watch. Bill took the tiller ; ropes were 
 hauled, slacked, made fast ; the boom awoke to 
 devastating life ; the Sheila swung, tilted over to 
 the breeze, and made a rush for freedom. The 
 rush ended in a jerk, the anchor remained im- 
 movable, and the process was repeated in the 
 opposite direction, with a vigour that restored 
 Chichester abruptly to the bosom of society — in 
 point of fact, my bosom. He said nothing, or 
 at least nothing to signify, as I assisted him to 
 rise, but I felt as if I were handling a live shell. 
 
 During the succeeding quarter of an hour the 
 Sheila, so it seemed to my untutored mind, con- 
 tinued to sail in tangents towards all the points 
 of the compass, and at the end of each tangent 
 was brought up with an uncompromising negative 
 from the anchor. By that time my invariable 
 yacht -headache was established, and all the other 
 men in the ship were advancing, at a varying rate 
 of progress, into a frame of mind that precluded 
 human intercourse, and was entirely removed from 
 perceiving any humour in the situation. 
 
 Through all these affairs the sound of conver- 
 sation ascended steadily through the main-hatch. 
 Lady Derryclare and my wife were playing 
 Patience in the cabin, and were at the same time 
 
 70 
 
Hhe Friend of Her Touth 
 
 discussing intricate matters in connection with 
 District Nurses, with that strange power of doing 
 one thing and talking about another that I have 
 often noticed in women. It was at about this 
 period that the small, rat-like head of Bill's 
 kitchen-maid, Jimmy, appeared at the fore-hatch 
 (accompanied by a reek of such potency that 
 I immediately assigned it to the pig's face), 
 and made the suggestion about the Congested 
 Diver. That the Diver, however congested, was 
 a public official, engaged at the moment in laying 
 the foundations of the Eyries Pier, did not, this 
 being Ireland, complicate the situation. The 
 punt, with Bill, hot and taciturn, in the stern, 
 sprang forth on her errand, smashing and bounc- 
 ing through the sharpened edges of the little 
 waves. As I faced that dainty and appetising 
 breeze, I felt the first pang of the same hunger 
 that was, I knew, already gnawing Chichester 
 like a wolf. 
 
 **We must have fouled some old moorings," 
 said D'erryclare, coming up from the cabin, with 
 a large slice of bread and honey in his hand, and 
 an equanimity somewhat restored by a working 
 solution of the problem. ** Damn nuisance, but 
 it can't be helped. Better get something to eat, 
 Chichester ; you won't get to Ecclestown before 
 three o'clock at the best." 
 
 71 
 
In Mr. Knoxs Country 
 
 ** No, thank you," said Chichester, without 
 raising his eyes from the four-day-old paper that 
 he was affecting to read. 
 
 I strolled discreetly away, and again looked 
 down through the skylight into the cabin. The 
 ladies were no longer there, and, in defiance of 
 all nautical regulations, a spirit-lamp with a kettle 
 upon it was burning on the table, a sufficient 
 indication to a person of my experience that 
 Philippa and Lady Derryclare had abandoned 
 hope of the Ecclestown lunch and were making 
 tea. The prospect of something to eat, of any 
 description, was not unpleasing ; in the meantime 
 I took the field-glasses, and went forward to 
 follow, pessimistically, the progress of the punt in 
 its search for the Diver. 
 
 There was no one on the pier. Bill landed, 
 went up the beach, and was lost to sight in the 
 yard of the public-house. 
 
 ** It must be he's at his dinner," said Jimmy 
 at my elbow, descrying these movements with a 
 vision that appeared to be equal to mine plus 
 the field-glasses. There was an interval, during 
 which I transferred my attention to Ecclestown ; 
 its white hotel basked in sunshine, settled and 
 balmy, as of the land of Beulah. Its comfortable 
 aspect suggested roast chicken, tingling glasses 
 of beer, even of champagne. A torpedo-boat, 
 
 72 
 
The Friend of Her Touth 
 
 with a thread of smoke coming quietly from its 
 foremost funnel, lay in front of the hotel. It 
 seemed as though it were enjoying an after- 
 luncheon cigarette. 
 
 ** They're coming out now!" said Jimmy, with 
 excitement ; " it must be they were within in the 
 house looking at the motor." 
 
 I turned the field-glasses on Eyries ; a fair 
 proportion of its population was emerging from 
 the yard of the public-house, and the length to 
 which their scientific interest had carried them 
 formed a pleasing subject for meditation. 
 
 " There's the ha'past-one mail-car coming in," 
 said Jimmy; ** it's likely he'll wait for the letters 
 
 now." 
 
 The mirage of the Ecclestown lunch here 
 melted away, as far as I was concerned, and 
 with a resignation perfected in many Petty Ses- 
 sions courts, I turned my appetite to humbler 
 issues. To those who have breakfasted at eight, 
 and have motored over thirty miles of moor- 
 land, tea and sardines at two o'clock are a 
 mere affair of outposts, that leave the heart of 
 the position untouched. Yet a temporary glow 
 of achievement may be attained by their means, 
 and the news brought back by Bill, coupled 
 with a fresh loaf, that the Diver was coming 
 at once, flattered the hope that the game was 
 
 73 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 still alive. Bill had also brought a telegram for 
 Chichester. 
 
 " Who has the nerve to tell Mr. Chichester that 
 there's something to eat here ? " said Lady Derry- 
 clare, minutely examining the butter. 
 
 ''Philippa is obviously indicated," I said ma- 
 lignly. " She is the Friend of his Youth ! " 
 
 " You're all odious," said Philippa, sliding from 
 beneath the flap of the table with the light of the 
 lion-tamer in her eye. 
 
 What transpired between her and the lion we 
 shall never know. She returned almost immedi- 
 ately, with a heightened colour, and the irrelevant 
 information that the Diver had come on board. 
 The news had the lifting power of a high 
 explosive. We burst from the cabin and went 
 on deck as one man, with the exception of my 
 wife, who, with a forethought that did her credit, 
 turned back to improvise a cosy for the teapot. 
 
 The Diver was a large person, of few words, 
 with a lowering brow and a heavy moustache. 
 He did not minimise the greatness of his con- 
 descension in coming aboard the yacht ; he lis- 
 tened gloomily to the explanations of Lord Derry- 
 clare. At the conclusion of the narrative he 
 moved in silence to the bows and surveyed the 
 situation. His boat, containing the apparatus of 
 his trade, was alongside; a stalwart underling, 
 
 74 
 
T^he Friend of Her Youth 
 
 clad in a brown jersey, sat in the bows ; in the 
 stern was enthroned the helmet, goggling upon 
 us like a decapitated motorist. It imparted a 
 thrill that I had not experienced since I read 
 Jules Verne at school. 
 
 ** Here, Jeremiah," said the Diver. 
 
 The satellite came on deck with the single 
 sinuous movement of a salmon. 
 
 The Diver motioned him to the windlass. 
 *' We'll take a turn at this first," he said. 
 
 They took each a handle, they bent to their 
 task, and the anchor rose at their summons like 
 a hot knife out of butter. 
 
 Every man present, with the exception of the 
 Diver and the satellite, made the simple declara- 
 tion that he was damned, and it was in the period 
 of paralysis following on this that a fresh ingre- 
 dient was added to the situation. 
 
 A giant voice filled the air, and m a windy 
 bellow came the words : 
 
 "Nice lot you are ! " 
 
 We faced about and saw " Ronnie's torpedo- 
 boat " executing a sw^eeping curve in the mouth 
 of Eyries Harbour. 
 
 ** Couldn't wait any longer!" proceeded the 
 voice of the Megaphone. ** We've got to pick 
 up the others outside. Thanks awfully for 
 luncheon ! Top-hole ! " 
 
 75 
 
/// Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 T.B. No. looo completed the curve and headed 
 for the open sea with a white mane of water 
 rising above her bows. There was something 
 else white fluttering at the stern. I put up the 
 field-glasses, and with their aid perceived upon 
 the deck a party of four ladies, one of whom was 
 waving a large pocket handkerchief. The glasses 
 were here taken out of my hand by Chichester, 
 but not before I had identified the Flapper. 
 
 What Chichester said of Ronnie was heard 
 only by me, and possibly by Jimmy, who did 
 not count. I think it may have saved his life, 
 being akin to opening a vein. That I was the 
 sole recipient of these confidences was perhaps 
 due to the fact that the Sheila^ so swiftly and 
 amazingly untethered, here began to fall away 
 to leeward, with all the wilful helplessness of her 
 kind, and instant and general confusion was the 
 result. There were a few moments during which 
 ropes, spars, and human beings pursued me wher- 
 ever I went. Then I heard Lord Derryclare's 
 voice — " Let go that anchor again ! " 
 
 The sliding rattle of the chain followed, the 
 anchor plunged ; the status quo was re-established. 
 
 Chichester went ashore with the Diver to catch 
 the outgoing mail-car. The telegram that had 
 arrived with Bill was brought into action flag- 
 rantly, and was as flagrantly accepted. (It was 
 
 76 
 
The Friend of Her Touth 
 
 found, subsequently, on his cabin floor, and was 
 to the effect that the cartridges had been for- 
 warded as directed.) The farewells were made, 
 the parting regrets very creditably accomplished, 
 and we stood on the deck and saw him go, with 
 his suit-case, his rods, his gun-case, heaped im- 
 posingly in the bow, his rug, and his coats, the 
 greater and the less, piled beside him in the 
 stern. 
 
 The wind had freshened ; the Diver and Jere- 
 miah drove the boat into it with a will, and the 
 heavy oars struck spray off the crests of the 
 waves. We saw Chichester draw forth the 
 greater coat, and stand up and put it on. The 
 boat lurched, and he sat down abruptly, only to 
 start to his feet again as if he had been stung by 
 a wasp. He thrust his hand into the pocket, and 
 Philippa clutched my arm. 
 
 ** Could it have been into the pocket of his 
 coat that I put the teapot ?" she breathed. 
 
 77 
 
IV 
 
 HARRINGTON'S 
 
 Breakfast was over ; Phillppa was feeding the 
 dogs. Philippa's cousin, Captain Andrew Larpent, 
 R.E., was looking out of the window with that 
 air of unemployment that touches the conscience 
 of a host like a spur. Andrew did not smoke, 
 a serious matter in a male guest, which means 
 that there are, for him, no moments of lethargy, 
 and that, when he idles, his idleness stands stark 
 in the foreground against a clear sky, a reproach 
 and a menace to his entertainers. 
 
 It was a cold day about the middle of September, 
 and there was an unrest among the trees that 
 commemorated a night of storm ; the gravel was 
 wet, the lawn-tennis ground was strewn with 
 sycamore leaves. 
 
 *' I suppose you'll say I'm drunk," said Andrew, 
 *'but the fact remains that I see two Natives 
 coming up the drive." 
 
 In the green tunnel that was the avenue at 
 Shreelane were two dark figures; both were 
 dressed in frock-coats, of which the tails fluttered 
 meagrely in the wind ; their faces were black ; 
 
 78 
 
Harrington s 
 
 with the half-hearted blackness of a leg in a black 
 silk stocking ; one of them wore a tall hat. 
 
 " This is what comes of leaving Calcutta with- 
 out paying your bills," I suggested ; " or perhaps 
 it's a Missionary Deputation " 
 
 The Natives advanced into the middle distance. 
 
 ** It's the Sweep!" exclaimed Philippa. ''It's 
 my beloved Cantillon ! " 
 
 She flung open the window. 
 
 ** Oh, Cantillon ! " she cried, invoking the 
 gentleman in the top-hat as if he were an idol, 
 ** I've been longing to see you ! " 
 
 The leading Native halted beneath the window 
 and curtseyed. 
 
 ** I partly guessed it, my Lady!" he replied 
 modestly, and curtseyed again. 
 
 ** Then why didn't you come before ? " screamed 
 Philippa, suppressing with difficulty the indigna- 
 tion of the dogs. 
 
 ** I had the toothache, my Lady, and a howlt 
 in my poll," returned the sweep, in dignified 
 narrative. " I may say my hands was crackin' with 
 the stren'th of pain, and these four days back 
 there was the rumour of passpiration all over me, 
 with respex to ye " 
 
 ''I'll see you in the kitchen," said Philippa, 
 shutting the window abruptly. *' My poor 
 friends," she continued, *' this means a cold 
 
 79 
 
In Mr, Knox^s Country 
 
 luncheon for you, and a still colder reception for 
 me from Mrs. Cadogan, but if I let Cantillon 
 escape me now, I may never see him again — 
 which is unthinkable ! " 
 
 I presume that white is the complimentary 
 colour of a sweep. In half an hour after the 
 arrival of Mr. Cantillon the sitting-rooms were 
 snowed over with sheets, covering alike floor and 
 furniture, while he and his disciple moved from 
 room to room on tiptoe, with ostentatious humility, 
 leaving a round black spoor upon the snow. My 
 writing-table was inaccessible, so also was the piano, 
 which could usually be trusted to keep Andrew 
 quiet for an hour of the morning. Perhaps it 
 would be more accurate to say it kept him 
 occupied. Captain Larpent had not been many 
 years in the service of his country, yet it was 
 already told of him that " From Birr to Bareilly," 
 undeterred by hardships, his intrepid piano had 
 accompanied him, and that house-rents fell to 
 zero within a half-mile radius of his vicinity. 
 Daily the walls of Shreelane shook to the thunder 
 of his practising ; nightly his duets with my wife 
 roared like a torrent over my sleeping head. 
 Sometimes, also, he sang, chiefly in German (a 
 language I do not understand), and with what 
 seemed to me superfluous energy. But this, I 
 am told, means ** temperament." 
 
 80 
 
Harringtoris 
 
 Haunting as a waltz refrain the flavour of soot 
 stole through the menu at dinner ; it was 
 whispered in the soup, it was muttered in the 
 savoury, and in the coffee it abandoned subter- 
 fuge and shouted down all opposition. Next 
 morning, at breakfast, Philippa asked if the car 
 wanted exercise, because it seemed to her a day 
 marked out by Providence for calling on the 
 Chicken Farmers. We might start early, take 
 sandwiches, show Andrew something of the 
 country — the programme was impulsively sketched 
 in, but none the less I divined that an indignant 
 household had demanded a day of atonement in 
 which to obliterate the memory of the sweep. 
 
 It was, as well as I remember, in the preceding 
 spring that the Chicken Farmers had come before 
 the swallow dared, and had taken — in addition to 
 the winds of March — a small farm about midway 
 in the wilderness between us and the Derryclares. 
 They were two young women who had recently 
 been commended to our special attention by 
 Lady Derryclare ; they were, she said, Pioneers, 
 and were going to make their fortunes, and 
 would incidentally set an example to the dis- 
 trict. Philippa had met them on the Derryclares' 
 yacht. 
 
 *'One of them is very pretty," she explained 
 to Andrew, **and the other is a doctor." 
 
 8i F 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 " I wonder which of them does most damage ? " 
 said Andrew. '' I think I'll stay at home." 
 None the less he came. 
 
 It was not until the car was at the door that I 
 found we were to be favoured with the society of 
 my eldest son, Anthony, in consequence of the 
 facts that (i) the day before had been his ninth 
 birthday, (2) that he had not cried when he met 
 the sweep in the passage, and (3) that for lack 
 of the kitchen fire he had had no birthday cake. 
 Minx, also, was one of us, but as she came as 
 a stowaway, this did not transpire till later, when 
 explanations were superfluous. 
 
 It was at the moment of departure that I 
 perceived a donkey-cart, modestly screening it- 
 self behind the evergreens on the way to the 
 yard, and one of Flurry Knox s men approached 
 me with Mr. Knox's compliments, and would I 
 lend him the loan of the long ladder .? Some two 
 years ago, in a moment of weakness, I had pro- 
 vided myself with a ladder wherewith to attain 
 to the eaveshoots of Shreelane, since when I had 
 found myself in the undesired position of public 
 benefactor. How life without a long ladder had 
 hitherto been possible for my neighbours I was 
 at a loss to imagine, and as I was also at a loss 
 for any valid excuse for refusing to lend it, the 
 ladder enjoyed a butterfly existence of country- 
 
 82 
 
Harrington's 
 
 house visiting. Its visits to Mr. Knox had been 
 especially lengthy and debilitating. It is, as 
 Mrs. Cadogan is wont to say, the last straw that 
 puts the hump on the camel. The blood sud- 
 denly mounted to my brain, and with it came 
 inspiration. 
 
 **You can tell Mr. Knox that the eaveshoots 
 of this house are leaking like sieves, and I want 
 the ladder myself." 
 
 In the glow of satisfaction kindled by the 
 delivery of this message I started the caravan. 
 The western breeze fanned my brow agreeably, 
 the car purred her satisfaction with our new and 
 only stretch of steam-rolled road, and Anthony 
 was still in the condition of Being Good (a con- 
 dition, nevertheless, by no means to be relied on, 
 and quite distinct from Goodness). 
 
 We ran west, we ran north ; we skirted grey 
 and sounding bays of the Atlantic ; we climbed 
 high among heathery, stone-besprinkled moors; 
 we lunched by the roadside in the lee of a rick 
 of turf, and Anthony, by this time emerging from 
 the condition of Being Good, broke the Thermos, 
 and flashed his birthday electric torch in Minx's 
 face until she very properly bit him, and Philippa 
 slurred over the incident with impartial chocolate, 
 and said it was time to start. 
 
 The region in which the Chicken Farmers had 
 
 83 
 
In Mr, Knox 5 Country 
 
 established themselves suggested the nurture of 
 snipe and sea-gulls rather 'than chickens. It was 
 an indeterminate patchwork of stony knobs of hill 
 and pockets of bog, among which the road humped 
 and sagged, accepting pessimistically the facts of 
 nature. Hardy, noisy hill-streams scurried beside 
 it, or over it, as seemed good to them ; finally a 
 sharp turn, a high horizon of sea, and a steep 
 down-hill grade, ending on the shore of a small, 
 round lake. There was a little pink box of a 
 house on its farther side, with a few bunches of 
 trees round it, and among them a pigmy village 
 of prim wooden huts. 
 
 ** That's the place," said Philippa, who had 
 been there with Lady Derryclare. ** And those 
 are the last cry in hen-houses. Now remember, 
 both of you, one of them is a doctor, Scotch, and 
 a theosophist, or something mysterious of that 
 sort ; and the pretty one was engaged to a 
 gunner and it was broken off — why, I don't 
 know — drink, I fancy, or mad — so you had 
 better be careful " 
 
 " I shall be guarded in my condolences," I 
 said, turning in at the little gate, with the 
 sensation of being forcibly fed. 
 
 " As far as one can gather," said Andrew, 
 ** there remains no topic in heaven or earth 
 
 that " 
 
 84 
 
Harringtofi's 
 
 " Music and poultry," said Phillppa in a breath, 
 as I drew up at the hall door. 
 
 Andrew rang the bell, and a flock of white 
 ducks hurried up from among the trees and 
 gathered round him with loud cries of welcome. 
 There was no other reply to his summons, and at 
 the second essay the bell-wire came out by the 
 roots with generous completeness. 
 
 *' The ladies is gone to th' oxtion ! " cried a 
 voice from among the hen-coops, and the ducks 
 lifted up their voices in ardent reply. 
 
 "Where is the auction?" Philippa called, 
 when a comparative silence had fallen. 
 
 "In Harrington's, beyond at the Mines!" 
 replied the oracle, on a well-sustained high G. 
 
 " Put the cards on the hall table," said Philippa, 
 ** we might go back that way." 
 
 Several things combine in the spell that an 
 auction casts upon my wife, as upon many others 
 of her sex ; the gamble, the competition, the 
 lure of the second-hand, the thrill of possible 
 treasure-trove. We proceeded along the coast 
 road towards the mines, and I could hear Philippa 
 expounding to her first-born the nature and 
 functions of auctions, even as the maternal carni- 
 vore instructs her young in the art of slaughter. 
 The road with which we were now dealing ran, 
 or, it would be more accurate to say, walked, 
 
 8S 
 
In Mr. Knoxs Country 
 
 across the stony laps of the hills. The cliffs 
 were on our right; the sea was still flustered 
 after the storm, like a dog that has fought and 
 is ready to fight again. We toiled over the 
 shoulder of a headland, and there caught sight 
 of ''Harrington's." 
 
 On a green plateau, high above the sea, were 
 a couple of iron sheds and a small squat tower ; 
 landward of them was a square and hideous 
 house, of the type that springs up, as if inevit- 
 ably, in the neighbourhood of mines, which are, 
 in themselves, among the most hideous works 
 of man. One of the sheds had but half a roof ; 
 a truck lay on its side in a pool of water ; defeat 
 was written starkly over all. 
 
 ** Copper, and precious little of it," I explained 
 to Andrew; "and they got some gold too- 
 just enough to go to their heads, and ruin 
 
 them." 
 
 *' Did they put it in their mouths— where you 
 have it, Father?" enquired Anthony, who was 
 hanging on my words and on the back of my 
 
 seat. . 
 
 ** Suppose you shut yours," I replied, with 
 
 the brutality that is the only effective defence 
 
 against the frontal attacks of the young. 
 
 ''We found the yard at Harrington's thronged 
 
 with a shabby company of carts, cars, and traps 
 
 86 
 
Harrington s 
 
 of many varieties ; donkey-carts had made their 
 own of the road outside, even the small circle 
 of gravel in front of the hall door was bordered 
 by bicycles ; apparently an auction was a fashion- 
 able function in the region of the Lug-na-Coppal 
 copper-mines. Dingy backs bulged from the 
 open door of the hall, and over their heads as 
 we arrived floated the voice of the auctioneer, 
 demanding in tragic incredulity if people thought 
 his conscience would permit him to let an 
 aneroid barometer go for half-a-crown. With- 
 out a word Philippa Inserted herself between the 
 backs, followed by her son, and was lost to view. 
 
 ** Thank you, madam!" said the voice, with 
 a new note of cheer in it. ** Five shillings I am 
 bid ! Any advance on five shillings ? " 
 
 ** That's a good weather-glass ! " hissed a 
 farmer's daughter with a plumed hat, to a friend 
 with a black shawl over her head. ** An' I 
 coming into the house to-day I gave it a puck, 
 and it knocked a lep out o' the needle. It's in 
 grand working order." 
 
 " I'm told it was the last thing in the house 
 poor Mr. Harrington left a hand on, the day he 
 made away with himself, the Lord save us!" 
 remarked a large matron, casually, to Andrew 
 and me. 
 
 " I thought the Coroner's Jury found that he 
 87 
 
In Mr, Knox 5 Country 
 
 fell down the shaft ? " I returned, accepting the 
 conversational opening in the spirit in which it 
 was offered. 
 
 The matron winked at me with a mixture of 
 compassion and confederacy. 
 
 ** Ah, the poor fellow was insured, and the 
 jury were decent men, they wouldn't wish to 
 have anything said that 'd put the wife out of the 
 money." 
 
 " The right men in the right place, evidently," 
 said Andrew, who rather fancies his dry humour. 
 " But apart from the climate and the architecture, 
 was there any reason for suicide ? " 
 
 ** I'm told he was a little annoyed," said an 
 enormous old farmer, delicately. 
 
 ** It was the weather preyed on him," said the 
 matron. ** There was a vessel was coming round 
 to him with coal and all sorts, weather-bound she 
 was, in Kinsale, and in the latther end she met 
 a rock, and she went down in a lump, and his 
 own brother that was in her was drownded." 
 
 " There were grounds for annoyance, I admit,*' 
 said Andrew. 
 
 The big farmer, who had, perhaps, been one 
 of the jury, remarked non-committally that he 
 wouldn't say much for the weather we were 
 getting now, and there was one of them planets 
 was after the moon always. 
 
 88 
 
Harrington s 
 
 We moved on to the yard, in which prospec- 
 tive buyers were prowling among wheelbarrows, 
 coils of rope, ladders, and the various rubbish 
 proper to such scenes, and Andrew discoursed 
 of the accessories that would be needed for the 
 repair of my eaveshoots, with the large-minded- 
 ness of the Government official who has his own 
 spurs and another man's horse. He was in the 
 act of assuring me that I should save half a man's 
 wages by having a second long ladder, when 
 some one in the house began to play on a piano, 
 with knowledge and vigour. The effect on 
 Captain Larpent was as when a hound, outside 
 a covert, hears the voice of a comrade within. 
 The room from which the music came was on 
 the ground floor, the back door was open, and 
 Andrew walked in. 
 
 ** That is one of those young ladies who have 
 come here to make their fortunes with poultry," 
 observed a melancholy-looking clergyman at my 
 elbow, '' Miss Longmuir, I expect ; she is the 
 musician. Her friend, Dr. Catherine Fraser, is 
 here also. Wonderful young ladies — no wish 
 for society. I begged them to come and live 
 near my church — I offered them a spare corner 
 of the churchyard for their hen-coops — all of no 
 avail." 
 
 I said that they seemed hard to please, 
 89 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 '' Very, very," assented the clergyman ; ** yet I 
 assure you there is nothing cynical about them. 
 They are merely recloozes." 
 
 He sighed, on what seemed to be general 
 grounds, and moved away. 
 
 I followed Andrew into the house and found 
 myself in the kitchen. The unspeakable dreari- 
 ness of an auction was upon it. Pagodas of 
 various crockeries stood high on the tables, and 
 on benches round the walls sat, rook-like, an 
 assembly of hooded countrywomen. A man 
 with a dingy pale face was standing in front of 
 the cold fireplace, addressing the company. On 
 my arrival he removed his hat with stately grace, 
 and with an effort I recognised Cantillon the 
 sweep, in mufti — that is to say, minus some of 
 his usual top-dressing of soot. 
 
 " It's what I was saying. Major Yeates," he 
 resumed. ** I'm sweeping those chimneys thirty 
 years, and five managers I seen in this house, 
 and there wasn't one o' them that got the price 
 of their ticket to Cork out o' that mine. This 
 poor man was as well-liked as anyone in the 
 world, but there was a covey of blagyards in 
 it that'd rob St. Pether, let alone poor Mr. 
 Harrington ! " 
 
 The company assented with a groan of general 
 application, and the ensuing pause was filled by 
 
 90 
 
Harrington s 
 
 the piano In the next room, large and heavy 
 chords, suggestive of the hand of Andrew. 
 
 **God! Mrs. Harrington was a fine woman!" 
 croaked one of the rooks on the bench. 
 
 *'She was, and very stylish," answered an- 
 other. *' Oh, surely she was a crown ! " 
 
 " And very plain," put in a third, taking up 
 the encomium like a part in a fugue, **as plain 
 as the grass on the hills ! " 
 
 I moved on, and met my wife in a crowd at 
 the door of the dining-room, and in an atmos- 
 phere which I prefer not to characterise. 
 
 "I've got the barometer!" she said breath- 
 lessly. '* No one bid for it, and I got it for five 
 shillings! A lovely old one. It's been in the 
 house for at least fifty years, handed on from one 
 manager to another." 
 
 *' It doesn't seem to have brought them luck," 
 I said. '* What have you done with Anthony ? 
 Lost him, I hope ! " 
 
 ** There have been moments when I could have 
 spared him," Philippa admitted, *' especially 
 when it came to his bidding against me, from the 
 heart of the crowd, for a brass tea~ketde, and 
 running the price up to the skies before I dis- 
 covered him. Then I found him upstairs, auction- 
 ing a nauseous old tail of false hair, amidst the 
 yells of country girls ; and finally he tried to drop 
 
 91 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 out of the staircase window — ten feet at least — 
 with a stolen basket of tools round his neck. I 
 just saw his hands on the edge of the window- 
 sill." 
 
 '* I think it's time to go home," I said grimly. 
 
 ** Darling, not till I've bought the copper coal- 
 scuttle. Come and look at it ! " 
 
 I followed her, uttering the impotent growls of 
 a husband. As we approachedithe drawing-room 
 the music broke forth again, this time in power. 
 Three broad countrywomen, in black hooded 
 cloaks and brown kid gloves, were seated on a 
 sofa ; two deeply-engrossed backs at the piano 
 accounted for the music. There is no denying 
 the fact that a piano duet has some inescapable 
 association with the schoolroom, no matter how 
 dashing the execution, how superior the per- 
 formers. 
 
 ** Poor old 'Semiramide * ! " whispered Philippa ; 
 *' I played that overture when I was twelve!" 
 Over her shoulder I had a view of Andrew's 
 sleek black poll and brown neck, and an impres- 
 sion of fluffy hair, and a slight and shapely back 
 in a Norfolk jacket. 
 
 ** He seems to have done very well in the 
 time," I said. " That's the pretty one, isn't it }'' 
 
 I here became aware that the hall was fill- 
 ing with people, and that Mr. Armstrong, the 
 
 92 
 
Harringtons 
 
 auctioneer, with his attendant swarm of buyers, 
 was at my elbow. 
 
 " That's a sweet instrument," he said dispassion- 
 ately, **and, I may say, magnificently played. 
 Come, ladies and gentlemen, we'll not interrupt 
 the concert. It might be as good for me to take 
 the yard next, before the rain comes." 
 
 He led away his swarm, like a queen bee ; 
 '* Semiramide" stormed on ; some people strayed 
 into the room and began to examine the furniture. 
 The afternoon had grown overcast and threaten- 
 ing, and I noticed that a tall man in dark clothes 
 and a yachting cap had stationed himself near the 
 treble's right hand. He was standing between 
 her and the light, rather rudely, it seemed to me, 
 but the players did not appear to notice. 
 
 ** That was rather a free and easy fellow," I 
 said to Philippa, as we were borne along to the 
 back door by the tide of auction. 
 
 ** Who ? Do you mean Mr. Armstrong ? " said 
 Philippa. ** I'm rather fond of him " 
 
 ** No, the tall chap in the yachting cap." 
 
 " I didn't notice him — " began Philippa, but at 
 this moment we were shot into the yard by 
 pressure from behind. Mr. Armstrong took his 
 stand on a packing-case, the people hived in 
 round him, and I saw my wife no more. 
 
 Coils of fencing wire and sheets of corrugated 
 93 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 iron were proffered, and left the audience cold ; a 
 faint interest was roused v/hen the auctioneer's clerk 
 held up one of a party of zinc pails for inspection. 
 
 ** You'd count the stars through that one ! " 
 said a woman beside me. 
 
 •* You can buy it for a telescope, ma'am ! " said 
 Mr. Armstrong swiftly. 
 
 ** Well, well, hasn't he a very fine delivery ! " 
 said my neighbour, regarding Mr. Armstrong as 
 if he were a landscape. 
 
 *' Hannah," said the woman on my other hand, 
 in a deep and reproachful contralto, speaking as 
 if I did not exist, " did ye let the kitchen chairs 
 go from you ? " 
 
 ** There wasn't one o' them but had a leg 
 astray," apologised Hannah — " they got great 
 hardship. When Harrington 'd have a drop taken 
 he'd throw them here and there." 
 
 •* Ladies ! Ladies! " reproved Mr. Armstrong. 
 "Is this an oxtion or is it a conversassiony ? 
 John ! show that ladder." 
 
 '*A big lot of use a forty-foot ladder 'd be 
 to the people round this place! " said a superior 
 young farmer in a new suit of clothes ; *' there isn't 
 a house here, unless it's my father's, would have 
 any occasion for it." 
 
 Hannah dug me hard in the ribs with her 
 elbow and put out her tongue. 
 
 94 
 
Harrington s 
 
 ** Five shillings I am bid for a forty-foot 
 ladder!" said Mr. Armstrong to the Heavens; 
 **rd get a better price at a jumble sale!" 
 
 '' Look at the poker they have in it by the 
 way of a rung ! " continued the young farmer. ** I 
 wouldn't be bothered buying things at oxtions ; 
 if it was only gettin' married you were you'd 
 like a new woman!" 
 
 ** Seven and six ! " 
 
 To my own astonishment I heard my voice 
 saying this. 
 
 ** Seven and six I am bid," said the auctioneer, 
 seizing me with his eye. " Ten shillings may I 
 say ? Thank you, sir " 
 
 The clergyman had entered the lists against me. 
 
 I advanced against him by half-crowns ; the 
 audience looked on as at a batde of giants. At 
 twenty-five shillings I knew that he was weak- 
 ening ; at thirty shillings the ladder was mine. 
 
 I backed out of the crowd with the victor's 
 laurels on my brow, and, as I did so, a speck 
 of rain hit me in the eye. The sea was looking 
 cold and angry, and the horizon to windward was 
 as thick as a hedge. It was obviously time to 
 go, and I proceeded in the direction of the car. 
 
 As I left the yard a remarkable little animal, 
 which for a single wild instant I took for a fox 
 or a badger, came running up the road. It was 
 
 95 
 
In Mr, Knoxs Country 
 
 reddish brown, with white cheeks and a white 
 throat ; it advanced hesitatingly and circled round 
 me with agitated and apologetic whimpers. 
 
 ** Minx ! " I said incredulously. 
 
 The fox or badger flung itself on its side and 
 waved a forepaw at me. 
 
 " It's hunting rabbits below on the cliffs she 
 was," said a boy in a white flannel jacket, who 
 was sitting on the wall. 
 
 *'Oh, there you are," said Philippa's voice 
 behind me ; "I wanted to remind you to re- 
 member the aneroid. It's on the dining-room 
 table. I'm feeling rather unhappy about that 
 child," she went on, ** I can't find him anywhere." 
 
 ** ril go in and find him," I said, with a father's 
 ferocity. 
 
 ** I hope he's there," said Philippa uncomfort- 
 ably. ** Good gracious ! Is that Minx ? " 
 
 I left the boy to explain, and made for the 
 house, getting through the crowd in the door- 
 way by the use of tongue and elbows, and 
 making my way upstairs, strode hastily through 
 the dark and repellent bedrooms of ** Harring- 
 ton's." Anthony was not there. 
 
 In the dining-room I heard Andrew's voice. 
 I went in and found him sitting at the dinner- 
 table with two ladies, one of whom was holding 
 his hand and examining it attentively. 
 
 96 
 
Harringtons 
 
 She had pale eyelashes, and pale golden hair, 
 very firmly and repressively arranged; she was 
 big and fresh and countrified looking, and her 
 eyes were water-green. She looked like an 
 Icelander or a Finn, but I recognised her as 
 the second Chicken Farmer, Dr. Fraser. 
 
 **I was looking for Anthony," I said, with- 
 holding with difficulty an apology for intrusion. 
 
 " We've got to get away, Andrew " 
 
 ** I was having my fortune told," said Andrew, 
 looking foolish. 
 
 *' I saw your little boy going across the field 
 there, about half an hour ago," said Dr. Fraser, 
 looking up at me with eyes of immediate 
 understanding. *'The white terrier was with 
 him." 
 
 ** Towards the cliffs?" I said, feeling glad that 
 Philippa was not there. 
 
 *' No, to the right-^towards the tower." She 
 went to the window. ^* There was some one with 
 him,"^ she added quickly. - There he is now— that 
 man in a yachting cap, by the tower " 
 
 '' I don't see anyone," I said, refixing my eye- 
 glass. 
 
 Miss Fraser continued to stare out of the 
 window. - You're short-sighted," she said, with- 
 out looking at me. " Perhaps if the window were 
 open " 
 
 97 G 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 Before I could help her she had opened it, and 
 the west wind rushed in, with big drops in it. 
 *a must be blind," I said, ** I can see no 
 
 one. 
 
 **Nor can I— now," she said, drawing back 
 
 from the window. 
 
 She sat down at the table as if her knees had 
 given way, and her strong white hand fell slackly 
 on Philippa s purchase, the old aneroid barometer, 
 and rested there. The other girl looked at her 
 
 anxiously. 
 
 '' Hold up, Cathie!" she said, as one speaks to 
 a horse when it stumbles. 
 
 Her friend's eyes were fixed, and empty of 
 expression, and the fresh pervading pink of her 
 face had paled. 
 
 ** Perhaps we had better go and look for that 
 kid," said Andrew, getting up, and I knew that 
 he too was aware of something uncomfortable in 
 the atmosphere. Before we could get out of the 
 room, Dr. ** Cathie " spoke. 
 
 '* I see tram-lines," she said gropingly, *' and 
 
 ^ater — I wonder if he's asleep " 
 
 She sighed. Andrew and I, standing aghast, 
 saw her colour begin to return. 
 
 Her friend's eye indicated to us the door. We 
 closed it behind us, and shoved our way through 
 
 the hall. 
 
 98 
 
Harrington s 
 
 " I say ! " said Andrew, as we got outside, " I 
 thought she was going to chuck a fit, or have 
 hysterics, or something. Didn't you ? " 
 
 I did not answer. Cantillon, the sweep, was 
 hurrying towards me with tidings in his face. 
 
 ** Mrs. Yeates is after going to the cliff looking 
 for the young gentleman — but sure what I was 
 
 saymg 
 
 I did not wait to hear what Cantillon's observa- 
 tions had been, because I had caught sight of 
 Philippa, away in a field near the edge of the 
 cliffs. She was running, and the boy with the 
 white flannel jacket was in front of her. It 
 seemed ridiculous to hurry, when I knew that 
 Anthony had been accompanied by a large man 
 in a yachting cap (in itself a guarantee of com- 
 petency). 
 
 None the less, I ran, with the wind and the 
 heavy raindrops in my face, across country, not 
 round by the road, and ran the faster for seeing 
 my wife and her companion sinking out of sight 
 over the edge of the cliff, as by an oblique path. 
 My way took me past the tower; there was a 
 little plateau there, with a drooping wire fence 
 round it, and I had a glimpse of the square black 
 mouth of the disused shaft. 
 
 ** Near the tower," the girl had said ; but she 
 had also said there was a man with him. 
 
 99 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 I ran on, but fear had sprung out of the shaft 
 and came with me. 
 
 A hard-trodden path led from the tower to the 
 cliff; it fell steeper and steeper, till, at a hairpin 
 turn, it became rocky steps, slanting in sharp-cut 
 zigzags down the face of the cliff. On the right 
 hand the rocks leaned out above my head, yellow 
 and grey and dripping, and tufted with sea pinks ; 
 on the left there was nothing except the wind. 
 A couple of hundred feet below the sea growled 
 and bellowed, plunging among broken rocks. I 
 did not give room to the thought of Anthony's 
 light body, tossed about there. 
 
 At a corner far below I had a glimpse of 
 Philippa and the boy in the white jacket ; he was 
 leading her down — holding her hand — my poor 
 Philippa, whose nightmare is height, who has 
 vertige on a step-ladder. She must have had a 
 sure word that Anthony had gone down this 
 dizzy path before her. A mass of rock rose up 
 between us, and they were gone, and in that 
 gusty and treacherous wind it was impossible to 
 make better speed. 
 
 The damnable iteration of the steps continued 
 till my knees shook and my brain was half numb. 
 They ceased at last at the mouth of a tunnel, 
 half-way down the vertical face of the cliff; there 
 was a platform outside it, over the edge of which 
 
 ioo 
 
Harrington's 
 
 two rusty rails projected into space above a 
 narrow cove, where yellow foam, far below, 
 churned and blew upwards in heavy flakes. 
 Philippa and her guide had vanished. I felt for 
 my match-box, and plunged into the dark and 
 dripping tunnel. 
 
 I pushed ahead, at such speed as is possible 
 for a six-foot man in a five-foot passage, splashing 
 in the stream that gurgled between the tram- 
 rails, and stumbling over the sleepers. Soon the 
 last touches of daylight glinted in the water, they 
 died, and it was pitch dark. I struck a match, 
 sheltering it with my cap from the drips of the 
 roof, and shouted, and stood still, listening. 
 There was no sound, except the muffled roar of 
 the sea outside ; the match kindled broad sparkles 
 of copper ore in the rock, but other response there 
 was none. 
 
 Match by match I got ahead, shouting at inter- 
 vals, stooping, groping, clutching at the greasy 
 baulks of timber that supported the roof and 
 sides, till a cold draught blew out my match. 
 My next revealed a cross-gallery, with a broken 
 truck blocking one entrance. There remained 
 two ways to choose between. It was certain 
 that the tram-rails must lead to the shaft, but 
 which way had Philippa gone? And Anthony 
 — I stood in maddening blackness ; some dark- 
 
 lOI 
 
In Mr, Knoxs Country 
 
 ness is a negative thing, this seemed an active, 
 malevolent pressure. I counted my matches, and 
 shouted, and still my voice came back to me, 
 baffled, and without a hope in it. There were 
 not half a dozen matches left. 
 
 A faint, paddling sound became audible above 
 the drippings from the roof; I struck another of 
 my matches, and something low and brown came 
 panting into the circle of light. It was Minx, 
 coming to me along the gallery of the tram-rails. 
 She paused just short of the cross-ways, staring 
 as though I were a stranger, and again a circling 
 wind blew out my match. A fresh light showed 
 her, still motionless ; her back was up, not in 
 the ordinary ridge, but in patches here and 
 there ; she was looking at something behind me ; 
 she made her mouth as round as a shilling, held 
 up her white throat, and howled, thinly and care- 
 fully, as if she were keening. I cannot deny 
 that I stiffened as I stood, and that second being 
 that inhabits us, the being that is awake when 
 we are asleep (and is always afraid), took charge 
 for a moment ; the other partner, who is, I try 
 to think, my real self, pulled himself together 
 with a certain amount of bad language, thrust 
 Minx aside, and went ahead along the gallery 
 of the tram-lines. 
 
 It needed only a dozen steps, and what Minx 
 
 102 
 
Harrington s 
 
 had or had not seen became a negligible matter. 
 A white light, that turned the flame of my 
 match to orange, began to irradiate the tunnel 
 like moonrise, defining theatrically the profiles 
 of rock, and the sagging props and beams. It 
 came from an electric lamp, Anthony's electric 
 lamp, standing on a heap of shale. The boy 
 in the flannel jacket was holding a lighted candle- 
 end in his fingers, and bending low over Philippa, 
 who was kneeling between the tram-lines in the 
 muddy water, holding Anthony in her arms. 
 He was motionless and limp, and I felt that 
 sickening drop of the heart that comes when the 
 thing that seems too bad to think of becomes in 
 an instant the thing that is. 
 
 " Tram-lines and water — " said a level voice 
 in my brain. '* I wonder if he is asleep " 
 
 I wondered too. 
 
 Philippa looked up, with eyes that accepted 
 me without comment. 
 
 ''Only stunned, I think," she said hoarsely. 
 " He opened his eyes an instant ago." 
 
 "The timber fell on him," said the country 
 boy. ** Look where he have the old prop 
 knocked. 'Twas little but he was dead." 
 
 Anthony stirred uneasily. 
 
 "Oh, mother, you're holding me too tight!" 
 he said fractiously. 
 
 103 
 
In Mr, Knoxs Country 
 
 From somewhere ahead vague noises came, 
 rumblings, scrapings, hangings like falling stones — 
 
 ** It must be they're putting a ladder down in 
 the shaft," said the boy. 
 
 Anthony had broken his collar-bone. So 
 Dr. Fraser said ; she tied him up with her 
 knitted scarf by the light of the electric torch; 
 I carried him up the ladder, and have an inefface- 
 able memory of the lavender glare of daylight 
 that met us, and of the welcome that was in 
 the everyday rain and the wet grass. In the 
 relief of the upper air I even bore with serenity 
 the didactics of Andrew, who assured me that 
 he had seen from the first that the shaft was the 
 centre of the position, though he had never been 
 in the slightest degree uneasy, because Dr. 
 Fraser had seen some one with Anthony. 
 
 Dr. Fraser said nothing ; no more did I. 
 
 **See now," said Cantillon the sweep, who, 
 in common with the rest of the auction, was 
 standing round the car to view our departure, 
 ** it pinched me like death when they told me 
 the Major had that laddher bought! " 
 
 Being at the time sufficiently occupied in pre- 
 paring to get away, I did not enquire why Can- 
 tillon should have taken the matter so much to 
 heart. 
 
 104 
 
Harringtori s 
 
 " But after all," he proceeded, having secured 
 the attention of his audience by an effective 
 opening, ** wasn't it the mercy of God them chaps 
 Mr. Knox has at the kennels had it lent to the 
 Mahonys, and them that's here took it from the 
 Mahonys in a hurry the time Mr. Harrington 
 died ! And through all it was the Major's 
 ladder." 
 
 Andrew had the ill-breeding to laugh. 
 
 " Sure it'd be no blame for a gentleman not 
 to know the like of it," said Cantillon with 
 severity. *' Faith, I mightn't know it meself only 
 for the old poker I stuck in it one time at Mr. 
 Knox's when a rung broke under me " 
 
 It is a valuable property of the motor-car that 
 it can, at a moment's notice, fill an inconvenient 
 interval with loud noises. I set the engine 
 going and jumped into the car. 
 
 Something, covered by a rug, cracked and 
 squashed under my foot. It was the aneroid. 
 
 When we reached a point in the road where 
 it skirts the cliff I stopped the car, and flung the 
 aneroid, like a quoit, over the edge, through the 
 wind and the rain, into oblivion. 
 
 105 
 
THE MAROAN PONY 
 
 It had taken ten minutes to work the car over 
 the bridge at Poundlick, so intricate was the 
 crowd of people and carts, so bHnd and deaf 
 to any concerns save their own ; a crowd that 
 offered sometimes the resistance of the feather 
 bed, sometimes that of the dead wall, an intract- 
 able mass, competent to reduce the traffic of 
 Piccadilly to chaos, and the august Piccadilly 
 police to the point of rushing to the nearest 
 lunatic asylum, and saying, ** Let us in ! We 
 are mad ! " 
 
 The town of Poundlick is built at so accom- 
 modating a tilt that it is possible to stand on the 
 bridge at its foot, and observe the life of its 
 single street displayed like a poster on the hill- 
 side ; even to compare the degrees of custom 
 enjoyed by its public-houses, and to estimate the 
 number of cur dogs to the square yard of pave- 
 ment. I speak of an ordinary day. But this 
 hot twentieth of September was far from being 
 ordinary. 
 
 The Poundlick Races are, I believe, an ancient 
 io6 
 
l^he Maroan ^ony 
 
 and annual function, but, being fifteen miles from 
 anywhere, I had hitherto been content to gauge 
 their attractions by their aftermath of cases in 
 the Petty Sessions Court next following the 
 fixture. There is, however, no creature more 
 the sport of circumstances than a married man 
 with a recent motor ; my attendance, and that 
 of the car, at the Poundlick Races had been 
 arranged to the last sandwich before I had time 
 to collect objections (and this method, after all, 
 saves some wear and tear). 
 
 The races are held on the banks of the Arri- 
 gadheel River, within hail of the town, and are 
 reached — as everything in Ireland is reached — 
 by a short cut. We — that is to say, my wife, 
 her cousin, Captain Andrew Larpent, R.E., and 
 I — were gathered into the jovial crowd that 
 straggled, and hustled, and discoursed over the 
 marshy meadows of the river, and ploughed 
 through the brown mud in the gaps without a 
 check in pace or conversation. The Committee 
 had indeed ** knocked " walls, and breached banks, 
 but had not further interfered with the course of 
 nature, and we filed at length on to the course 
 across a tributary of the river, paying a penny 
 each for the facilities offered by a narrow and 
 bounding plank and the muddy elbow of a young 
 man who stood in mid-stream ; an amenity 
 accepted with suitable yells by the ladies (of 
 
 107 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 whom at least ninety per cent, remarked **0 
 God ! " in transit). 
 
 The fact that there are but four sound and 
 level fields within a ten-mile radius of Poundlick 
 had simplified the labours of the Committee in 
 the selection of a course. Rocky hills rose steeply 
 on two sides of the favoured spot, the Arrigadheel 
 laid down the law as to its boundaries, and within 
 these Hmitations an oval course had been laid 
 out by the simple expedient of breaking gaps 
 in the banks. The single jump-race on the pro- 
 gramme was arranged for by filling the gaps with 
 bundles of furze, and there was also a water-jump, 
 more or less forced upon the Committee by the 
 intervention of a ditch pertaining to one of the 
 fences. A section of the ditch had been widened 
 and dammed, and the shallow trough of pea- 
 soup that resulted had been raised from the 
 rank of a puddle by a thin decoration of cut 
 furze-bushes. 
 
 The races had not begun, but many horses 
 were galloping about and over the course, whether 
 engaged in unofficial competitions or in adding a 
 final bloom to their training, I am unable to say. 
 We wandered deviously among groups of country 
 people, anchored in conversation, or moving, still 
 in conversation, as irresistibly as a bog-slide. 
 Whether we barged into them, or they into us, 
 was a matter of as complete indifference to them 
 
 io8 
 
The Maroan Tony 
 
 as it would have been to a drove of their own 
 bony cattle. 
 
 *' These are the sort of people I love," said 
 Philippa, her eyes ranging over the tented field 
 and its throngs, and its little red and green flags 
 flapping in the sunshine. *' Real Primitives, like 
 a chorus in Acis and Galatea ! " 
 
 She straightened her hat with a gasp, as a 
 couple of weighty female primitives went through 
 us and passed on. (In all circumstances and 
 fashions, my wife wears a large hat, and thereby 
 adds enormously to the difficulties of life.) Among 
 the stalls of apples and biscuits, and adjacent to 
 the drink tent, a roulette table occurred, at which 
 the public were invited to stake on various items 
 of the arms of the United Kingdom. The public 
 had accepted the invitation in considerable num- 
 bers, and 1 did not fail to point out to Philippa 
 the sophisticated ease with which Acis flung 
 his penny upon *' Harp," while Galatea, planking 
 twopence upon the Prince of Wales' plumes, 
 declared that the last races she was at she got 
 the price of her ticket on ** Feather." 
 
 We passed on, awaking elusive hopes in the 
 bosoms of two neglected bookmakers, who had 
 at intervals bellowed listlessly to the elements, 
 and now eagerly offered me Rambling Katty at 
 two to one. 
 
 *' Boys, hurry I There's a man dead, north ! " 
 109 
 
In Mr, Knox^s Country 
 
 shrieked a boy, leaping from the top of a bank. 
 ** Come north till we see him ! " 
 
 A rush of boys went over us ; the roulette table 
 was deserted in a flash, and its proprietor and the 
 bookmakers exchanged glances expressive of the 
 despicable frivolity of the rustics of Poundlick. 
 
 **We ought to try to find Dr. Fraser," said 
 Philippa, hurrying in the wake of the stampede. 
 
 ** I did not know that the Chicken Farmers 
 were to be among the attractions," I said to 
 Andrew, realising, not for the first time, that I 
 am but an infant crying in the night where 
 matters of the higher diplomacy are toward. 
 
 Andrew made no reply, as is the simple method 
 of some men when they do not propose to give 
 themselves away, and we proceeded in the direc- 
 tion of the catastrophe. 
 
 The dead man was even less dead than I had 
 expected. He was leaning against a fence, explain- 
 ing to Dr. Catherine Fraser that he felt all the 
 noise of all the wars of all the worlds within in 
 his head. 
 
 Dr. Fraser, who was holding his wrist, while 
 her friend. Miss Longmuir, kept the small boys 
 at bay, replied that she would like a more 
 precise description. The sufferer, whose colour 
 was returning, varied the metaphor, and said 
 that the sound was for all the world like the 
 quacking of ducks. 
 
 no 
 
** L3mey's a tough dog: ' " 
 
7he Maroan ^ony 
 
 "You'd better go home and keep quiet," said 
 Dr. Fraser, accepting the symptom with pro- 
 fessional gravity. 
 
 I asked my next door neighbour how the 
 accident had occurred. 
 
 " Danny Lyons here was practising this young 
 mare of Herlihy's for Lyney Garrett, that's to 
 ride her in the first race," said my neighbour, 
 a serious man with bushy black whiskers, like 
 an old-fashioned French waiter, *'and sure she's 
 as loose as a hare, and when she saw the flag 
 before her on the fence, she went into the sky, 
 and Danny dhruv in the spur to keep the balance, 
 and with that then the sterrup broke." 
 
 ** It's little blagyarding she'd have if it was 
 Lyney was riding her! " said some one else.. 
 
 "Ah, Lyney's a tough dog," said my neigh- 
 bour ; *' in the Ring of Ireland there isn't a nicer 
 rider." 
 
 '* There might be men as good as him in 
 Poundlick ! " said an ugly little black-muzzled 
 fellow, suddenly and offensively, *'and horses 
 too ! As good as any he II throw his leg over ! " 
 
 Dr. Fraser's patient stood up abruptly. 
 
 "Oh, oh, oh!" said the man with the bushy 
 whiskers, placing himself in front of the invalid. 
 *' Let you be said by the lady, Danny, and go 
 home ! Have behaviour now, Peter Lynch ! " 
 
 The matter hung for a moment ; a bell began 
 III 
 
In Mr, Knoxs Country 
 
 to ring in the middle of the course, and the 
 onlookers flung the situation from them like a 
 squeezed lemon, and swept en masse towards the 
 summons, bearing with them the invalid. 
 
 " Off the stage I have never seen people clear 
 out so fast," remarked Andrew. " Now that 
 we've seen Dr. Eraser's Lightning Cure, I sup- 
 pose we may as well go too." 
 
 His eyes, by a singular coincidence, met those 
 of Miss Longmuir, which were very pretty eyes, 
 dark and soft. 
 
 ** I must go and hunt up our pony," she said, 
 with a very businesslike air ; ''we've entered her 
 for the third race, you know." 
 
 She put back her hair as it blew across her 
 forehead, and the gold in it glinted in the sun. 
 
 ** How sporting of you ! " we heard Andrew 
 say, as they walked away together. 
 
 My wife and Dr. Fraser and I turned as one 
 man, and went in the opposite direction. 
 
 We steered for an island of furze and grey 
 boulders that had been flung into the valley 
 like a vedette from the fortified hill-side, and 
 was placed, considerately, at the apex of the 
 oval course. Half a dozen men were already 
 grouped upon the boulders, like cormorants. 
 We clambered to a higher ^tage, and there 
 spread forth ourselves and our belongings upon 
 the warm slabs. The sun was hot, yet not too 
 
 112 
 
The Maroan ^ony 
 
 hot, the smell of trodden turf was pleasant in the 
 air, the river sparkled and gurgled beside us ; 
 the chimneys of Poundlick sent up languid spires 
 of blue smoke ; its yellow and pink and white 
 houses became poetic in the September haze. 
 The first delicate pangs of hunger were stealing 
 upon us, and I felt reasonably certain that 
 nothing necessary to our welfare had been for- 
 gotten. I lit a cigarette and pulled my cap over 
 my eyes, and listened to a lark, spiring, like the 
 smoke, into the blue, while my wife clattered in 
 the luncheon basket. It was a moment of entire 
 well-being, overshadowed only by the prospect 
 of having to take an interest in the racing. 
 
 I said as much to Dr. Fraser, who was dis- 
 membering a cold chicken with almost awful 
 surgical dexterity. 
 
 " You must wake up for our race," she said. 
 **ril call you in time." 
 
 " Must I .»* I hope you're going to ride." 
 
 ** Heaven forfend ! " replied Dr. Fraser. 
 " Nothing more spirited than a weight-carrying 
 bicycle! I'm not in the least horsey. Meg was 
 dying to ride, but as we bought the pony from 
 the great Lyney, and he had won any number 
 of races on her, he was distinctly indicated." 
 
 "Quite right too," I said, with dowager-like 
 propriety. " And I should wish it to be clearly 
 understood that if, at the last moment, your 
 
 113 H 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 friend Mr. Lyney should be too drunk to ride, 
 I will not take his place." 
 
 *' He doesn't drink," said Dr. Fraser, who has 
 an unsympathetic way of keeping to the point. 
 '* He's been a great friend of mine ever since I 
 mended a broken finger for him." 
 
 There was a stir among the cormorants on the 
 lower tier of boulders, a shot was fired at the far 
 end of the course, every one began to shout, and 
 an irregularly shaped mass was detached from 
 the crowd, and resolved itself into a group of 
 seven horses, pounding towards us at a lumber- 
 ing canter. One of the riders had a green jacket, 
 the others were in shirt sleeves, with coloured 
 scarves over their shoulders ; all were bare- 
 headed. As they neared the first jump, I found 
 myself on my feet on my boulder, with two un- 
 known men hanging on to me to steady them- 
 selves. 
 
 '* That's no throuble to them ! " shouted one of 
 my attaches, as each horse in turn galloped over 
 or through the barrier of furze in the gap. 
 
 "Which is Lyney Garrett?" I asked. 
 
 ** That's him on the chestnut mare — the jock 
 that have the dhress on him." He pointed to 
 the wearer of the green jacket. 
 
 '* Ah ha ! Lyney's the boy ! Look at him now, 
 how he'll stoop and leave the horse to go for her- 
 self ! He'll easy the horse, and he'll easy himself! " 
 
 114 
 
T^he Maroan Tony 
 
 "That Rambling Katty he's riding's a nice 
 loose mare — she has a good fly in her," said 
 another. 
 
 ** Lyney's built for it. If there's any sort of 
 a spring in a horse at all, he'll make him do it." 
 
 ** He'd make a donkey plough !" flung in another 
 enthusiast. 
 
 As they neared the flags at the turn of the 
 oval — and an uncommonly sharp turn it was — 
 the pace improved, each man trying to get the 
 inside station ; I could already see, written on 
 the countenance of a large young grey horse, 
 his determination to pursue an undeviating course 
 of his own. 
 
 ** Now, Lyney ! Spare him in the angle ! " 
 shouted my neighbour, hanging on to my sleeve 
 and rocking perilously. 
 
 Lyney, a square-shouldered young man, pale 
 and long-jawed, bored determinedly on to the 
 first flag, hit it with his right knee, wrenched 
 Rambling Katty round the second flag, and got 
 away for the water-jump three lengths ahead of 
 anyone else. 
 
 " Look at that for ye — how he goes round the 
 corner on one leg ! " roared his supporter. ** He'd 
 not stop for the Lord Leftenant ! " 
 
 The remaining riders fought their way round 
 the flags, with strange tangents and interlacing 
 curves ; all, that is to say, save the grey horse, 
 
 115 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 who held on unswervingly and made straight 
 for the river. The spectators, seated on the 
 low bank at its edge, left their seats with singular 
 unanimity. The majority fled, a little boy turned 
 a somersault backwards into the water, but three 
 or four hardier spirits tore off their coats, swung 
 them like flails in front of the grey, and threw 
 their caps in his face, with a wealth of objurga- 
 tion that I have rarely heard equalled. 
 
 '* The speed was in him and he couldn't turn," 
 explained one of my neighbours, at the top of 
 his voice, as the grey, yielding to public opinion, 
 returned to the course and resumed the race. 
 
 ** That horse is no good," said a dapper young 
 priest, who had joined our crowd on the rock. 
 ** Look at his great flat feet ! You'd bake a 
 cake on each of them ! " 
 
 '•Well, that's the case indeed. Father," replied 
 a grizzled old farmer, "but he's a fine cool horse, 
 and a great farming horse for ever. Be gance ! 
 He'd plough the rocks ! " 
 
 " Well, he'll get a nice view of the race, any- 
 way," said the young priest, **he has it all before 
 him." 
 
 " They don't seem to be getting any delay 
 with the water-jump," said some one else regret- 
 fully. 
 
 ••Ah, what's in it but the full of a few tin 
 cans ! " said my adherent. 
 
 ii6 
 
The Maroan Tony 
 
 " Well, for all, it knocked a good lep out o' 
 Rambling Katty : she went mountains over it ! " 
 
 " Look south ! Look south ! They're coming 
 on again, and only five o' them in it " 
 
 The cheering was hotter this time, and it was 
 entirely characteristic that it was the riders who 
 were shouted for and not the horses. 
 
 " They'll win now this turn — there's three o' 
 them very thick, that's a nice tidy race," said the 
 old farmer. 
 
 ''Good boy, Kenny! Go on, Kenny!" bel- 
 lowed some one on a lower ledge. 
 
 " Who's second, coming up to the flag now ? " 
 panted Philippa, who was hanging on to the 
 collar of my coat and trying to see over my 
 shoulder. 
 
 ** That's Jimmy Kenny," responded the man 
 below, turning a black-muzzled face up towards 
 us, his light eyes gleaming between their black 
 lashes in the sunshine, like aquamarines. I re- 
 cognised Peter Lynch, whom we had met earlier 
 in the day. 
 
 " It's young Kenny out of the shop," ex- 
 plained the old farmer to me ; " he rides very 
 nate." 
 
 No one was found to endorse his opinion. 
 The horses came on, sweating and blowing, the 
 riders, by this time very red in the face, already 
 taking to their whips. By some intricate process 
 
 117 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 of jostling, young Kenny got the inside place at 
 the first flag. 
 
 **Now is he nate! What was I saying!" 
 exulted the old farmer. 
 
 ** Lyney ! Lyney ! " roared the faithful gallery, 
 as the leaders hustled round the second flag and 
 went away up the course. 
 
 **Up, Kenny!" replied the raucous tenor of 
 Peter Lynch in solitary defiance. 
 
 Last of all, the grey horse, who would plough 
 the rocks, came on indomitably, and made, as 
 before, a bee-line for the river. Here, however, 
 he was confronted by a demonstration hurriedly 
 arranged by his friends, who advanced upon him 
 waving tall furze-bushes, with which they beat 
 him in the face. The grey horse changed his 
 mind with such celerity that he burst his girths ; 
 some one caught him by the head, while his 
 rider hung precariously upon his neck ; some 
 one else dragged off the saddle, replanted his 
 jockey upon his broad bare back, and speeded 
 him on his way by bringing the saddle down 
 upon his hind-quarters with an all-embracing 
 thump. 
 
 ''It's only the age he wants," said a partisan. 
 "If they'd keep him up to the practice, he'd be 
 a sweeper yet! " 
 
 Tumult at the end of the course, and a pistol- 
 shot, here announced that the race was over. 
 
 ii8 
 
The Maroan ^ony 
 
 " Lyney have it!" shouted some men, stand- 
 ing on the fence by the water-jump. 
 
 **What happened Kenny?" bawled Peter 
 Lynch. 
 
 " He was passing the flag and he got clung 
 in the pole, and the next man knocked him down 
 out of the pole!" shouted back the Field Tele- 
 graph. 
 
 ** Oh pity ! " said the old farmer. 
 
 "He didn't get fair play!" vociferated Peter 
 Lynch, glowering up at the adherents of Lyney 
 with a very green light in his eye. 
 
 The young priest made a slight and repressive 
 gesture with his hand. ** That'll do now, Peter," 
 he said, and turned to the old farmer. ** Well, 
 Rambling Katty's a hardy bit of stuff," he went 
 on, brushing the rock-lichen from his black coat. 
 
 " She is that. Father," responded my late ad- 
 herent, who, to my considerable relief, had now 
 ceased to adhere. "And nothing in her but a 
 fistful of bran ! " 
 
 " She's the dryest horse that came in," said the 
 young priest, descending actively from the rock. 
 
 With the knowledge that the Committee would 
 allow an hour at least for the effects of a race to 
 pass off before launching another, we climbed to 
 the summit of the island, and began upon the 
 luncheon basket ; and, as vultures drop from the 
 blue empyrean, so did Andrew and Miss Long- 
 
 119 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 muir arrive from nowhere and settle upon the 
 sandwiches. 
 
 ** Oh, I can't eat our own game, can I ? " said 
 the latter, with a slight shudder, as I placed the 
 chicken before her. '' No — really — not even for 
 your sake ! " She regarded me very pleasingly, 
 but I notice that it is only since my hair began 
 to turn grey over my ears that these things are 
 openly said to me. ** I had to feed four dozen of 
 the brutes before we started this morning, and I 
 shall have to do it all over again when we get 
 home!" 
 
 ** I don't know how you stand it, I should let 
 'em starve," said Andrew, his eyes travelling 
 from her white forehead to her brown hands. **/ 
 don't consider it is work for ladies." 
 
 ** You can come and help the ladies if you 
 like," said Miss Longmuir, glancing at him as 
 she drove her white teeth into a sandwich. 
 
 ** Do you mean that?" said Andrew in a low 
 voice. 
 
 ** She's blown him to pieces before he's left the 
 covert," I said to myself, and immediately with- 
 drew into blameless conversation with my wife 
 and Dr. Fraser. 
 
 We had gone pretty well down through the 
 luncheon basket, and had arrived at a second and 
 even more balmy — being well-fed — period of 
 peace, before it occurred to Miss Longmuir to 
 
 120 
 
The Maroan '^ony 
 
 look at her watch, and to spoil the best cigarette 
 of the day with agitations concerning the non- 
 appearance of her pony. I suggested that she 
 and Captain Larpent should go in search of it, 
 and for a brief interval the disturbing element 
 was eliminated. It returned, with added agita- 
 tion, in a quarter of an hour. 
 
 ** Cathie! I can't find Nancy anywhere! 
 We've been all round the course," cried Miss 
 Longmuir from below. ** And John Sullivan is 
 nowhere to be found either, and I can't get near 
 Lyney, he's riding in the Trotting Race." 
 
 *' You'll find the pony is somewhere about all 
 right," I said, with the optimism of combined 
 indolence and indifference. 
 
 ''That seems probable," said Andrew, ''but 
 the point is, she's somewhere where we're not." 
 
 " The point is, she ought to be here," said 
 Miss Longmuir, with a very bright colour in her 
 cheeks as she looked up at us. 
 
 "Heavens! They're very angry!" I mur- 
 mured to Dr. Fraser. 
 
 " Well, what do you want us to do .-^ " enquired 
 Dr. Fraser lethargically. 
 
 " You might take some faint shadow of interest 
 in the fact that Nancy is lost," replied Miss 
 Longmuir. 
 
 " I think we'd better organise a search-party," 
 said Philippa (who does not smoke). 
 
 121 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 We rose stiffly, descended from our sun-warmed 
 boulders, and took up the White Man's Burden. 
 
 A sweeping movement was inaugurated, whose 
 objects were to find the pony or her attendant, 
 John SulHvan, or Lyney. 
 
 " Should you know the pony if you saw her ? " 
 I said confidentially to Dr. Fraser, as she and I 
 set forth together. 
 
 "We've not had it very long,'* she replied 
 dubiously. ** Luckily it's an easy colour. John 
 Sullivan calls it maroan — a sort of mixture of 
 roan and maroon." 
 
 We advanced from field to field, driving like 
 twin darning-needles through the groups of 
 people, but neither John Sullivan nor the maroan 
 pony transpired. 
 
 " Come on, come on ! The Stepping Match is 
 starting ! " shouted some one. 
 
 Dr. Fraser and I were caught in the tightening 
 mesh of the crowd, as in the intricacies of a 
 trammel net ; an irregular thumping of hoofs, and 
 a row of bare and bobbing heads, passing above 
 the heads of the crowd, indicated that the Stepping 
 Match was under way. Lyney's dour face and 
 green jacket were in the lead, and, as before, had 
 he been Diana of the Ephesians, he could not 
 have been more passionately called upon. As it 
 was obviously useless for us to do so at this 
 juncture, we climbed on to a bank near the 
 
 122 
 
The Maroan ^ony 
 
 winning post, and watched the race. Lyney was 
 riding a long-backed yellow animal with a face as 
 cross as his own, and a step as fast as the tick of 
 a watch. 
 
 ** Anny other man than Lyney wouldn't carry 
 that old pony round," said one man. 
 
 " She has a score o' years surely, but she's as 
 wicked as a bee," said another. 
 
 ** Lyney 's very knacky ; he couldn't be bate," 
 said the first man. 
 
 *' Well, well, look at Jimmy Kenny and his 
 father, and the two o' them riding ! " went on the 
 commentator. " Faith, I'd give the father the 
 sway. Jimmy's riding uneven. When the nag 
 is rising, he's falling." 
 
 ** Sure he has his two elbows into his ears ! 
 Go on, Lyney boy ! " 
 
 The horses pounded past, splashing through 
 the shallow flood of the water-jump, and tramp- 
 ling over such furze-bushes as had withstood the 
 vicissitudes of the steeplechase. They passed 
 from our view, and Dr. Fraser and I agreed that 
 we should be justified in staying where we were 
 till the finish. Three times they passed us, 
 enveloped in a travelling roar of encouragements, 
 and with each passing the supporters of Lyney 
 and Kenny bayed and howled more emulously. 
 The competitors, now, to all practical intent, 
 reduced to the Kennys, pere et fils, and Lyney, 
 
 123 
 
/;; Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 again disappeared on their last round, and the 
 volleys of incitement became a dropping fire of 
 criticism. 
 
 " Kenny's mare is the one, the others is too 
 crippled." 
 
 "She'll not bate Lyney ! Divil blast the bate 
 she have in her! she's too dropped and too 
 narra ! " 
 
 *' What horse is first ? " 
 
 ** I d'know ; only one, I think." 
 
 " Look at young Kenny coming up on the 
 father now ! " 
 
 "Ah, there's more in the owld fella, never fear 
 him ! " 
 
 ** Come on, Lyney ! Come on, Kenny ! Lyney ! 
 Lyney ! " 
 
 Lyney won. The bee-like wickedness of the 
 yellow mare apparently served her as well as 
 youth, and despite the fact that she was but little 
 over fourteen hands and was carrying twelve 
 stone, she finished a dozen lengths in front. The 
 interest of the race was at once transferred to the 
 struggle for second place between the Kennys. 
 
 ** Come on, Tom ! Come on, Jimmy ! Begor' 
 the father have it ! " yelled the crowd, as Kenny 
 pere, flourishing his whip over his grey head, 
 finished half a length in front of his son. 
 
 " Them two tight wheels at the corner, 'twas 
 there he squeezed the advantage on the son." 
 
 124 
 
The Maroan Tofiy 
 
 " No, but the father had a drop taken, 'twas 
 that that gave him the heart." 
 
 Dr. Fraser and I got off our fence and steered 
 for Lyney. 
 
 He was in the act of throwing the reins on 
 the pony's neck and himself off her back as we 
 arrived. 
 
 "Here!" he said to the owner, ** take your 
 old skin ! " — he tossed his whip on to the 
 ground — ** and your old whip too ! " 
 
 The owner took the "old skin" by her droop- 
 ing and dripping head, and picked up the whip, 
 in reverential submission, and the ring of ad- 
 mirers evidently accepted this mood of the hero 
 as entirely befitting his dignity. 
 
 Dr. Fraser advanced through them with the 
 effortless impressiveness of a big woman, and 
 made her enquiries about the pony. Lyney 
 dropped the hero manner. 
 
 ** I don't at all doubt but John Sullivan's gone 
 up to Lynch's for her, Doctor ; you needn't be 
 uneasy at all," he said, with a respect that must 
 have greatly enhanced our position in the eyes 
 of the crowd. ** I told him he shouldn't bring 
 her too soon for fear she'd sour on us. We 
 have an hour yet." 
 
 Soothed by this assurance we moved on, and 
 even, in this moment of unexpected leisure, 
 dallied with the roulette table. I had, in fact, 
 
 125 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 lost ninepence, when the remainder of the search- 
 party bore down upon us at speed. 
 
 ** The pony is not here ! " said Miss Longmuir, 
 regarding our outspread coppers with an eye of 
 burning indignation, '* and Sullivan's brother 
 doesn't know where he is — says he went up to 
 the town two hours ago. I'm going up to look 
 for him, but of course if you'd rather stay and 
 play roulette — " Her voice shook. I need 
 hardly say that we went. 
 
 On our arrival at the town of Poundlick we 
 found it to be exclusively inhabited by grand- 
 mothers. Lynch's public-house was garrisoned 
 by a very competent member of the force, who 
 emerged from the kitchen with an infant in her 
 arms, and another attached to her clothing. She 
 knew nothing of the pony, she knew nothing of 
 John Sullivan. There was certainly a young lad 
 that came in, and he having drink taken, and 
 wherever he got it, it wasn't in this house, and 
 what did he do but to commence jumping the 
 counter, you'd think he'd jump the house. She 
 paused, and I murmured to Dr. Fraser that she 
 was like a Holbein, and Dr. Fraser replied that 
 she did not believe one word she said, which was 
 rather my own idea, only more so. It appeared 
 that her son Peter had, an hour ago, expelled 
 the young lad from the house (lest its fair 
 fame should be sullied), and as for Peter, the 
 
 126 
 
The Maroan Vony 
 
 dear knew where he was, she didn't see him 
 since. 
 
 Miss Longmuir and Andrew here left the shop, 
 very purposefully ; we pursued, and saw them 
 open the gate of Lynch's yard and stride in. 
 The yard was a small one, littered with cases of 
 bottles, and congested by the outside cars and 
 carts of race-goers ; such level spaces as it pos- 
 sessed had been dug out of the side of the hill, 
 and slatternly stables and outhouses were perched 
 on the different levels. Through a low-browed 
 doorway might be seen the horses of race-goers, 
 standing " ready dight," like the steeds of Brank- 
 some Hall, with heads hanging, in resigned de- 
 pression, before empty ranks and mangers. But 
 of the maroan pony there was no sign. 
 
 Fierce as terriers on a rat-hunt, Miss Long- 
 muir and Andrew dashed in and out of the dark 
 sheds and outhouses, till there remained unex- 
 plored but one hovel, whose open door revealed 
 only semi-darkness, edged with fern-litter. None 
 the less, the leading terrier determined to make 
 good the ground. A sharp yelp told of a find, 
 and Miss Longmuir emerged, holding aloft a 
 new check horse-sheet, with the initials ** M. L." 
 large upon it. 
 
 *' They must have taken her down to the race- 
 course, after all — " I began. 
 
 '' Thoughtless of them to take her without her 
 127 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 saddle or bridle," said Andrew bitingly. " Here 
 they are behind the door ! " 
 
 The silence that followed this discovery was 
 broken by Philippa. 
 
 ** I hear some one snoring ! " she said in a con- 
 spirator's whisper. "Do come away. I'm sure 
 it's a drunken man." 
 
 " Quite so," said Andrew, who had been pur- 
 suing his researches. ** Allow me to introduce 
 Mr. John Sullivan." 
 
 In the dark corner behind the door lay a stout 
 youth, comfortably extended, with his flushed 
 face half hidden in the dry and tawny bracken, 
 and his open mouth framing long and quiet 
 snores. He was obviously at peace with all 
 the world. 
 
 Some heartless assaults on the part of Captain 
 Larpent had no appreciable result, so inveterate 
 was the peace, so potent the means by which it 
 had been invoked. The ladies had retired dur- 
 ing the interview, and, as we rejoined them in 
 the yard, we all became aware of muffled and 
 thunderous sounds near at hand ; they were sug- 
 gestive of a ponderous and chaotic clog-dance, 
 and proceeded from an outhouse, built against 
 the bank that formed the upper side of the yard, 
 with its gable askew to the other buildings. 
 
 *' * Lots of things is coor'us,' as Anthony said 
 when I told him about Jonah and the Whale," 
 
 128 
 
The Maroan ^ony 
 
 remarked Philippa, who, throughout, had not 
 taken the affair as seriously as it deserved. " I 
 suppose the party that John Sullivan was at 
 is going on up there." 
 
 Miss Lonormuir darted round the gable of the 
 
 o o 
 
 house, a wild and summoning cry followed, the 
 call of the terrier who has run his rat to ground. 
 
 We found her at the foot of a low flight of 
 irregular stone steps (in telling the story I have 
 formed the habit of saying that there were ten 
 of them) that led to a doorway in a loft. In 
 the doorway, with a cabbage leaf in her mouth, 
 was the maroan pony, looking down at us with 
 an expression of mild surprise. 
 
 We all said unanimously, and with equal futility, 
 '' How — on — earth .^ " 
 
 After which Andrew, who dislikes miracles, 
 arranged that she had, of course, got into the 
 loft from the back, where the ground was high. 
 Unfortunately the theory did not work, an in- 
 spection of the loft revealing nothing but four 
 walls, a large store of dried bracken, and a donkey- 
 panier filled with cabbages. 
 
 " These mountainy ponies climb like monkeys," 
 said Philippa, with her inevitable effort to shelter 
 the discomfited, as Andrew returned with the 
 ruins of his theory, *' she must have walked up 
 the steps ! " 
 
 Miss Longmuir, snatching out her watch, said 
 129 I 
 
In Mr. Knox's Countfj 
 
 she didn't care how the pony got there, the point 
 was to get her down as quickly as possible. ** If 
 people would only do something and not talk ! " 
 she added, under her breath. 
 
 ** If she walked up she can walk down," said 
 Andrew firmly. 
 
 He mounted the steps and took the pony 
 by the halter. The pony immediately backed 
 thunderously out of sight, taking Andrew with 
 her. Miss Longmuir flew up the steps to his 
 assistance, and unseen sarabands pummelled the 
 floor of the loft. 
 
 *' Go up and help them, you great lazy thing ! '* 
 said Philippa to me. 
 
 ** There's no room for any one else," I protested. 
 
 Here the combatants reappeared in the door- 
 way, gradually, with endearments on one side, 
 and suspicious snortings on the other. The steps 
 were broad and not too intimidating ; the pony 
 advanced almost to the sill, repented in haste, 
 and in her retreat flung Andrew against the 
 panier of cabbages. A donkey's panier is made 
 to resist shocks ; in this case it apparently gave 
 more than it took ; Andrew said nothing, but he 
 draorgfed the basket over the sill and hurled it 
 down the steps with considerable emotion. I 
 joined the party in the loft, and Philippa collected 
 the cabbages, and laid them in rows upon the 
 steps as if it were a harvest festival, in the hope 
 
 130 
 
The Maroan Tony 
 
 of luring the pony to the descent. The lure was 
 rejected with indignation, and I proceeded to offer 
 a few plain truths. That the floor would come 
 down before the mare did. That it would take 
 six men, and planks, and cartloads of straw, to 
 get her out. Finally, that her race was due to 
 start in twenty minutes. 
 
 ** We're done," said Miss Longmuir tragically, 
 addressing Philippa and Dr. Fraser from the 
 top of the steps, as if they were a stage mob. 
 ** These brutes have beaten us I Don't you 
 remember that Lyney's father said, * Let ye keep 
 out from them lads in Poundlick ' ? And after all 
 our trouble, and the training, and everything — " 
 She turned abruptly away from the door. 
 
 Dr. Fraser stood still, with her hand to her 
 forehead, as though she were trying to remember 
 something. Then she too came up into the loft. 
 The pony had now backed into the pile of bracken ; 
 Andrew, whose back teeth were evidently set 
 tight, was tugging at her halter, and she was 
 responding by throwing her nose in the air and 
 showing the whites of her eyes. 
 
 ** Meg," said Dr. Fraser, at the doorway, ** I've 
 remembered something that I was once told — " 
 She peered into the darkness of the loft. *' May 
 I try ? " she said, advancing quietly to the pony's 
 head. 
 
 **By all means," said Andrew, as chillingly as 
 131 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 was possible for a man who was very red in the 
 face and was draped with cobwebs. 
 
 Looking back now to the affair, I cannot 
 remember that Dr. Fraser did anything in the 
 least remarkable. She took hold of the halter 
 with one hand and with the other patted the 
 pony's neck, high up, near the ears. She also 
 spoke to it, the sort of things anyone might say. 
 For the life of me I could not see that she did 
 more than anyone else had done, but Nancy 
 lowered her head and put her ears forward. 
 
 Dr. Fraser gave the halter a gentle pull, and 
 said, ** Come on, old girl ! " and the pony started 
 forward with a little run. 
 
 At the doorway she stopped. We held our 
 breaths. Dr. Fraser patted her again and placidly 
 descended the first step ; the maroan pony placed 
 a trembling foot upon the threshold, steadied 
 herself, poked her nose forward, and dropped her 
 forefeet on to the second step. 
 
 " She'll come down on top of her ! " said 
 Andrew, starting forward. 
 
 *' Don't touch her ! " exclaimed Miss Longmuir, 
 grasping his arm. 
 
 With the tense caution of an old dog, the pony 
 let herself down from step to step, planting her 
 little hoofs cunningly on the rough-set stones, 
 bracing herself with the skill learned on the rocky 
 staircases of her native hills. Dr. Fraser kept a 
 
 132 
 
^he Maroan Pony 
 
 step in advance of her. Thus, with slow clatter- 
 ing, and in deep gravity, they joined Philippa in 
 the yard. 
 
 Five people cannot advantageously collaborate 
 in putting a saddle and bridle on a pony, but we 
 tried, and in the grim hustle that resulted no one 
 asked questions or made comments. Amongst 
 us the thing was done, and there were still seven 
 minutes in hand when Andrew shot out of the 
 yard on her back. Hard on her heels followed 
 Philippa and Miss Longmuir, with scarcely inferior 
 velocity. I returned to the remaining member 
 of the party and found that she had seated her- 
 self on the steps. 
 
 She said she was tired, and she looked it. 
 
 ** I daresay getting that beast down the steps 
 was rather a strain ? " I said, spreading the pony's 
 rua- for her to sit on. 
 
 ** Oh, that was nothing. Please don't wait for 
 
 me." 
 
 I said in my best ironic manner that doctors 
 were of course impervious to fatigue, and indeed 
 superior to all human ills. 
 
 She laughed. ** I admit that I was rather 
 nervous that the thing wouldn't work, or would 
 break down half-way." 
 
 '' What thing ? " I demanded. ** The pony?" 
 
 " No. The secret. It is a secret, you know. 
 My grandfather gave Rarey thirty pounds for it. 
 
 133 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 I've never had much to say to horses, but I have 
 started a jibbing hansom horse in Oxford Street 
 with it." She laughed again, apologetically. 
 
 ** You needn't believe it unless you like. I 
 must say I was afraid it mightn't include a flight 
 of steps ! " She paused and put back her abun- 
 dant fair hair. ** How hot it was up in that loft! 
 I wonder if you could get me a glass of water ? " 
 
 I told her that I was old enough to believe 
 anything, but added that after what she had told 
 me I would get a second glass of water, with sal 
 volatile in it, for myself. 
 
 The Holbein orrand mother was stand ino- at the 
 back door of the house, with the baby still on her 
 arm. She and the baby fetched the glass of 
 water. She said wasn't the pony a Fright for 
 ever after the way he came down them steps, but 
 why wouldn't the lady take him out through the 
 other door into the field above ? 
 
 I made no reply, but while Dr. Fraser was 
 drinking the water, I went up into the loft, and 
 cleared away the bracken that had been piled in 
 front of the ** door into the field above." I opened 
 the door, and walked out into the field, and viewed 
 the small hoof-prints that led to the door of the 
 loft. 
 
 I returned to Dr. Fraser, and very gently broke 
 the news to her. 
 
 134 
 
The Maroan ^ony 
 
 Of course Lyney and the maroan pony won the 
 race. Had this not been a foregone conclusion 
 it is possible that John Sullivan might have 
 scored less heavily in the matter of free drinks. 
 
 As I was conducting my exhausted but trium- 
 phant party off the course, the Poundlick Sergeant 
 of Police met me and asked me if I would sien a 
 few summonses for him, as he was after taking 
 some parties into custody for fighting. 
 
 " Drunk, I suppose ? " 
 
 The Sergeant admitted it, and said the dispute 
 had arisen between the Kennys and the Lynches 
 on the one side, and the partisans of Lyney 
 Garrett on the other, out of " circumstances con- 
 nected with the last race." The Sergeant's eye 
 rested for an instant, with what may be described 
 as a respectful twinkle, upon Miss Longmuir. 
 
 '* It was mostly heavy offers and small blows, 
 Major," he concluded. 
 
 " Look here. Sergeant," I said oracularly, **take 
 them all to the water-jump. Build up the furze 
 in front of it. Make them jump it. Anyone 
 that gets over it may be considered sober. Any- 
 one that falls in will be sober enough when he 
 gets out." 
 
 I have not, in my judicial career, delivered 
 a judgment that gave more satisfaction to the 
 public. 
 
 135 
 
VI 
 
 MAJOR APOLLO RIGGS 
 
 Part I 
 
 The leave of Captain Andrew Larpent, R.E., 
 was expiring, dying hard, **in rings of strenuous 
 flight," (and my motor) on the road between 
 Shreelane and Licknavar, which is the home of 
 the Chicken Farmers. Philippa, who regards a 
 flirtation with an enthusiasm that is as dis- 
 interested as it is inexplicable, assured me that 
 the state of affairs was perfectly unmistakable. 
 She further said that the male determination to 
 deny and ignore these things was partly sym- 
 pathetic secretiveness, partly the affectation of 
 despising gossip, and mainly stupidity. She took 
 a long breath after all this, and, seeing Andrew 
 approaching along the garden path in apparently 
 romantic meditation, enjoined me to be nice to 
 the poor thing, and departed. 
 
 The sun was bright, with the shallow bright- 
 ness of early October, and the Virginian creeper 
 made a conflagration on the weather-slated end 
 of the house. The poor thing deposited himself 
 beside me on the garden seat. I noticed that 
 
 136 
 
Major Apollo '^^ggs 
 
 his eye rested upon a white chicken with a 
 brilliant scarlet comb; it was one of several, 
 purchased from the Chicken Farmers. I would 
 not for worlds have admitted it to Philippa, but 
 there was undoubtedly sentiment in the glance. 
 
 ** I hear they're having beastly weather at the 
 Curragh," he said, leaning back and looking 
 gloomily up into the melting blue sky. ** Stun- 
 ning that red stuff looks on the house ! " He sur- 
 veyed it, and sighed ; then, suddenly, sentiment 
 faded from his glance. " D'you know, old boy, 
 that chimney up there is well out of the perpendi- 
 cular. It'll be down about your ears some day." 
 
 I replied that it had maintained that angle for 
 the seven years of my tenancy. 
 
 *' It won't do it much longer," returned my 
 guest. *' Look at that crack in the plaster ! " 
 
 " Which crack ? " I said coldly. (Mr. Flurry 
 Knox is my landlord, and it is my misfortune to 
 have a repairing lease.) 
 
 "Take your choice," said Andrew, scanning 
 the chimneys with the alert and pitiful eye of the 
 Royal Engineer. ** My money's on the northern 
 one, under the jackdaw." 
 
 " Oh, confound you and the jackdaws ! " I said 
 pettishly. ** The chimney draws all right." 
 
 But the matter did not end there. Before 
 luncheon, Andrew and I had made a tour of the 
 
 137 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 roof, and he had demonstrated unanswerably, and 
 with appalling examples from barracks that he had 
 repaired in Central India, and built in Wei-hai- 
 Wei, that nothing but habit and family feeling 
 induced any one of the chimney stacks to stand up. 
 
 At luncheon he told Philippa that he hoped 
 she would insure the children before the next 
 westerly gale. Philippa replied by asking if he, 
 or anyone else, had ever heard of a chimney 
 falling, unless it had been struck by lightning, in 
 which case it wouldn't matter if it were straight or 
 crooked ; and though this was manifestly worth- 
 less as an argument, neither Andrew nor I could 
 remember an instance in support of our case. 
 That the case had now become mine as well as 
 Andrew's was the logical result of illogical opposi- 
 tion, and at Philippa's door I deposit the responsi- 
 bility for a winter of as varied discomforts as it 
 has been our lot to endure. 
 
 The matter matured rapidly. In the mellow 
 moment that comes with coffee and cigarettes, I 
 began, almost pleasurably, to lay out the campaign. 
 
 ** I can't see any point in wasting money on a 
 contractor," said Andrew airily. "Any of your 
 local masons could do it if I explained the job to 
 him. A fortnight ought to see it through." 
 
 It was at this point that I should have sat 
 heavily upon Andrew. I was not without ex- 
 
 138 
 
♦'Walkin' Aisy." 
 
Major dApollo '^^Jggs 
 
 perience of the local mason and his fortnights ; 
 what could Andrew know of such ? I had a brief 
 and warning vision of Captain Larpent, seated at 
 an office table adorned with sheets of perfect 
 ground-plans and elevations, issuing instructions 
 to a tensely intelligent Sapper Sergeant. I saw 
 the Sergeant, supreme in scientific skill (and in- 
 variably sober), passing on the orders to a scarcely 
 less skilled company of prompt subordinates — but 
 my ** worser angel " obliterated it. And that very 
 afternoon, on our way to Aussolas, we chanced 
 to meet upon the road the local mason himself, 
 William Shanahan, better known to fame as 
 ** Walkin' Aisy." He was progressing at a rate 
 of speed that accorded with his sub-title, and, as 
 I approached him, a line of half-forgotten verse 
 came back : 
 
 '* Entreat her not, her eyes are full of dreams." 
 
 Nevertheless, I stopped the car. 
 
 In answer to enquiries, he mused, with his 
 apostolic countenance bent upon the ground ; 
 after a period of profound meditation, he asked 
 me why wouldn't I get one of the big fellas out 
 from the town ? I have never known Walkin' 
 Aisy to accept a job without suggesting that 
 some one else could do it better than he (in which 
 he was probably quite right). This may have 
 
 139 
 
/;; Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 been humility, due to the fact that his father had 
 been that despised thing, "a dry-wall builder"; 
 it may have been from coquetry, but I am inclined 
 to think it was due to a mixture of other-worldli- 
 ness and sloth. 
 
 On pressure he said that he had still a small 
 pieceen of work to finish, but he might be able to 
 come down to-morrow to travel the roof and see 
 what would be wanting to us, and on Monday 
 week, with the help of God, he would come in it. 
 His blue eyes wavered towards the horizon. The 
 interview closed. 
 
 "*Fair and young were they when in hope 
 they began that long journey,'" cooed Philippa, 
 as we moved away. The quotation did not, as I 
 well knew, refer to our visit to the Knoxes. 
 
 At Aussolas I aired my project to my land- 
 lord. Flurry is not a person to whom it is 
 agreeable to air a project. 
 
 " Rebuild the chimneys, is it? Oh, with all my 
 heart. Is there anything the matter with them ?" 
 
 Andrew explained the imminence of our peril, 
 and Flurry listened to him with his inscrutable 
 eye on me. 
 
 *'Well, it'll be some fun for you during the 
 winter. Major, but be careful when you're cutting 
 the ivy ! " 
 
 I was betrayed into asking why. 
 140 
 
Major Apollo %jggs 
 
 ** Because there's only it and the weather-slat- 
 ing keeping the walls standing." 
 
 ** If I may presume to contradict one so much 
 younger than myself," said old Mrs. Knox, 
 " Shreelane is as well built a house as there is in 
 the county." Her voice was, as ever, reminiscent 
 of a bygone century and society ; it was also 
 keen-edged, as became a weapon of many wars, 
 ancient and modern. She turned to me. ** In 
 the storm of '39 I remember that my father said 
 that if Shreelane fell not a house in Ireland would 
 stand. Every one in the house spent that night 
 in the kitchen." 
 
 ** May be that was nothing new to them," 
 suggested Flurry. 
 
 Mrs. Knox regarded her grandson steadfastly 
 and continued her story. It has already been 
 noted that when he and she were of the same 
 company they considered no other antagonist 
 worthy of their steel. 
 
 *' It was my great-grandfather who built Shree- 
 lane in honour of his marriage," she went on. 
 *' He married a Riggs of Castle Riggs, a cousin 
 of the celebrated Major Apollo — and thereby 
 hangs a tale!" She blinked her eyes like an 
 old rat, and looked round at each of us in turn. 
 I felt as if I were being regarded through a tele- 
 scope, from the standpoint of a distant century. 
 
 141 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 **They knew how to build in those days," she 
 began again. ** The basement story of Shreelane 
 is all vaulted." 
 
 ** I daresay the kitchen would make a nice 
 vault," said Flurry. 
 
 His grandmother looked hard at him, and was 
 silent, which seemed to me a rather remarkable 
 occurrence. 
 
 On the following day, Andrew and Walkin' 
 Aisy ** travelled the roof," and I accompanied 
 them — that is to say, I sat on the warm lead, with 
 my back against the sunny side of a chimney, 
 and smoked torpidly, while Andrew preached, 
 firmly and distinctly, from the top of a ladder. 
 Walkin' Aisy stood at the foot of the ladder, 
 submissive, with folded hands, and upturned 
 bearded face, looking like an elderly saint in the 
 lower corner of a stained-glass window. At the 
 conclusion of the lecture he said that surely the 
 chimneys might fall any minute, but, for all, they 
 might stand a hundred years ; a criticism almost 
 stupefying in its width of outlook. 
 
 The following day Captain Larpent departed to 
 the Curragh, and, as is often the way of human 
 beings with regard to their guests, we partly 
 breathed more freely, and partly regretted him. 
 On the whole it was restful. 
 
 A fortnight passed, and I had almost forgotten 
 142 
 
Major dApollo '^Bjggs 
 
 about the chimneys ; I was in the act of making 
 an early start for an absence of a couple of days 
 at the farther side of my district, when I en- 
 countered Walkin' Aisy at the hall door. 
 
 *' I'm here since six o'clock this morning, but 
 I had no one to tend me," he began. 
 
 I was familiar with this plaint, and proffered 
 him the yard boy. 
 
 **The young fella's too wake," replied Walkin' 
 Aisy, in his slow and dreamy voice, "and they 
 takes him from me." His mild eyes rested upon 
 me in saddened reverie. ** And there should be 
 morthar mixed," he resumed slowly, " and there's 
 not a pick of gravel in the yard." 
 
 I said, as I pulled on my gloves, that he could 
 have Johnny Brien from the garden to minister 
 to him, and that there was no hurry about the 
 mortar. 
 
 " Well, it's what I was saying to the gardener," 
 returned Walkin' Aisy very slowly, ** I have no 
 business coming here at all till those chimneys is 
 taken down. The sahmint that's on them is very 
 strong. It's what the gardener said, that quarry- 
 men would be wanting." 
 
 *' Why the devil didn't you say this at first ? " 
 I demanded, not without heat. '* You and Cap- 
 tain Larpent told me that the old cement had no 
 more hold than the sugar on a cake." 
 
 143 
 
//; Mr, Knoxs Country 
 
 "Well, the Captain knows best," replied Walkin* 
 Aisy gently, '' we should do what he says." 
 
 **Well, get the chimneys down; I don't care 
 who does it." 
 
 I drove away, and from the turn of the drive 
 saw Walkin' Aisy, in motionless trance, looking 
 after the car as if it were a chariot of hre. 
 
 The well-known routine followed ; the long 
 and airless day in the Court-house, the roar of 
 battle of the rival solicitors, the wearisome itera- 
 tion of drunks and trespasses, the intricacies of 
 family feuds ; the stodgy and solitary dinner at 
 the hotel, followed by the evening in the arid 
 smoking-room, the stale politics of its habitues, the 
 stagnant pessimism of the proprietor, the same 
 thing over again next day and the day after. 
 
 It was not until the afternoon of the third day 
 that I found myself serenely gliding homeward, 
 with the wind behind me, and before me the 
 prospect of that idleness that, like the only thirst 
 worth having, has been earned. I was in the 
 straight for the hall door, when I saw my wife 
 dart from the house, gesticulating, and waving 
 her handkerchief as if to check my approach. 
 She was followed, at no great interval, by an 
 avalanche of rubble and bricks from the roof, that 
 fell like a portent from heaven, and joined itself 
 to a considerable heap by the steps. 
 
 144 
 
Major aApollo '^^jggs 
 
 ** You never know when it's coming ! " she cried 
 breathlessly. ** I've been watching for you. It*s 
 impossible to make them hear from below, and I 
 can't find any of the men — they're all on the roof." 
 
 The restoration had begun, but that fact might 
 not have occurred to a stranger. Next day, and 
 for many days — six weeks, to be exact — the house 
 shook as from the blows of a battering-ram, in 
 response to the efforts of the quarrymen to re- 
 move from the chimneys the cement that had 
 no more hold on them than the sugar on a cake, 
 and at frequent and uncertain intervals various 
 debris rumbled down the roof and fell heavily 
 below. There were days when it fell in front of 
 the house, there were days when it fell in the 
 flower garden ; where it fell, there it lay, because 
 there was no one to take it away ; all were 
 absorbed in tending Walkin' Aisy, and the 
 murmurs of their inexhaustible conversation 
 came to us down the chimneys like the hoarse 
 cooing of wood pigeons. There were also days 
 when by reason of storms and rain nothing 
 was done, and black and evil floods de- 
 scended into the rooms down the ruins of the 
 chimneys, and through the slates, broken by the 
 feet of the quarrymen. At Christmas the 
 kitchen chimney alone remained in action, and 
 we ate our Christmas dinner in fur coats and a 
 
 145 K 
 
In Mr, Knoxs Country 
 
 fireless dining-room. Philippa refrained from 
 any allusion to the quotation from Longfellow 
 that she had made after that first interview with 
 Walkin Aisy. She even denied herself the 
 gratification of adding its context : 
 
 ** Faded and old were they when in disappoint- 
 ment it ended," but I knew that she was think- 
 ing it. 
 
 Part II 
 
 It was somewhere towards the end of March 
 that one chimney stack re-entered the list of 
 combatants, trim in new cement, and crowned 
 with tall and hideous chimney-pots. They all 
 smoked, a thing that had never occurred before, 
 but Walkin' Aisy said that the chimneys were 
 cold, and that they wouldn't do it when they'd 
 come to themselves ; and (this was a little later 
 on) that any chimney would smoke in an east 
 wind. It was true that a period of east wind 
 and drought had set in. The pump in the yard 
 went dry ; carts had to be sent half a mile for 
 water, and it was reported to me that the 
 masons had as much water put astray, mixing 
 mortar and all sorts, as would drown a herring. 
 
 Other unpleasant things occurred. The house- 
 maid gave half-an-hour's warning, and married 
 one of the quarrymen, and Mrs. Cadogan then 
 
 146 
 
Major (iApollo "^Bjggs 
 
 revealed that it wasn't once nor twice during the 
 winter that she had given that particular quarry- 
 man the full of the poker, to put him out from 
 under her feet when she'd be dishing up the 
 dinner. Shreelane was twice drawn blank by- 
 Flurry Knox's hounds, and their master said 
 that as long as I had every idle blackguard in 
 the country tending Walkin' Aisy, and making 
 short cuts through the covert, how would I have 
 foxes there? I ignored the conundrum, and 
 hoped that the quarryman's yellow dog would 
 remain where I had last seen him, in the ashpit, 
 till Flurry had left the premises. 
 
 It was some little time after this that Captain 
 Larpent advanced upon us on a week's leave 
 from the Curragh ; he wrote to say that I 
 evidently wanted a Clerk of the Works, and 
 that he would see if he couldn't get a move on 
 Shanahan. I was away when he arrived, and 
 on my return Philippa met me in the hall. 
 
 ** Meg Longmuir is here ! " she said, not with- 
 out a touch of defiance. ** Doctor Catherine had 
 to go to Scotland, so I asked Meg here for a few 
 days. She'll play duets with Andrew. She's 
 up on the roof with him now." 
 
 ** Better have a string band up there at once," I 
 said, "and open it as a public recreation ground.'* 
 
 **And the Flurry Knoxes and Bernard Shute 
 147 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 are coming to dinner," continued my wife, 
 ignoring this jeu d' esprit; "the smoking-room 
 chimney is all right, and we can have the oil 
 stove and some music in the drawing-room." 
 
 With this agreeable prospect in store, we sat 
 down to dinner. We were too many for general 
 conversation, and the table was round, which is 
 unfavourable for tite-h-tHes. Yet it was not 
 round enough to frustrate Miss Meg Longmuir's 
 peculiar gift for duets, and I was presently aware 
 that she was unwarrantably devoting herself to 
 Bernard Shute, leaving Captain Larpent derelict, 
 and that the latter was, after the manner of dere- 
 licts, becoming a danger to navigation, and was 
 laying down laws and arguing about them acridly 
 with Mr. Knox. I realised too late that there 
 should have been champagne. Whisky and soda 
 is all very well, but it will not warm wet blankets. 
 
 Meg Longmuir, however, was doing remark- 
 ably well without either; she wore something 
 intricate that was either green or blue or both, 
 and glittered. I recognised it as the panoply 
 of war, and knew that the tomahawk was con- 
 cealed in its folds. So also was Andrew's scalp ; 
 I don't know why I felt some pleasure in re- 
 membering that it had a bald patch on it. 
 
 After the ladies had gone, Bernard, to whose 
 head Miss Longmuir had mounted as effectively 
 
 148 
 
Major (tApollo "^B^gs 
 
 as if she had been the missing champagne, re- 
 joined the lesser world of men by asking Flurry 
 why he had shut up the season so early, and 
 suggested a by-day, if only for the sake of giving 
 the horses something to do. 
 
 Flurry put the end of his cigarette into his 
 finger-glass, and lit another at the flaming tongue 
 of my tame Chinese dragon. 
 
 " I didn't know you had one that would carry 
 a lady ? " he said. 
 
 ** Oh rot ! " said Bernard helplessly. 
 
 ** I haven't one that will carry myself,'' went 
 on Flurry. ** There's five lame legs among three 
 of them this minute. Anyway the hounds are 
 in sulphur." 
 
 The discussion progressed with the prolixity 
 proper to such themes ; I think it was Andrew 
 who suggested the paper-chase. He had, he 
 said, ridden in paper-chases in Egypt, and he 
 gave us details of the stark mud walls and 
 fathomless water-courses that were common- 
 places of these events. We were left with the im- 
 pression that none of us had ever seen obstacles 
 so intimidating, and, more than that, if we had 
 seen them we should have gone home in tears. 
 
 ** I think we'd better make a hare of you^'^ 
 said Flurry, fixing expressionless eyes upon 
 Captain Larpent. ** It mightn't be hard." 
 
 149 
 
In Mr. Knoxs Country 
 
 The double edge of this suggestion was lost 
 upon Andrew, who accepted it as a tribute, but 
 said he was afraid he didn't know the country 
 well enough. 
 
 " That's your Egyptian darkness," said Flurry 
 with unexpected erudition. 
 
 Andrew glanced sideways and suspiciously at 
 him over the bridge of his sunburnt nose, and 
 said rather defiantly that if he could get hold of a 
 decent horse he wouldn't mind having a try. 
 
 ** I suppose you ride about 11.6?" asked 
 Flurry, after a moment or two of silence. His 
 manner had softened ; I thought I knew what 
 was coming. *' I've a little horse that I was 
 thinking of parting . . ." he began. 
 
 A yell, sharp and sudden as a flash of light- 
 ning, was uttered outside the door, followed by a 
 sliding crash of crockery, and more yells. We 
 plunged into the hall, and saw Julia, the elderly 
 parlourmaid, struggling on the floor amid ruins of 
 coffee cups and their adjuncts. 
 
 **The rat! He went in under me foot!" she 
 shrieked. ** He's in under me this minute ! " 
 
 Here the rat emerged from the ruins. Simul- 
 taneously the drawing-room door burst open, and 
 the streaming shrieks of Minx and her son and 
 daughter were added to those of the still pro- 
 strate Julia. 
 
 150 
 
Major ^Apollo %iggs 
 
 The chase swept down the passage to the 
 kitchen stairs, the pack augmented by Bob, the 
 red setter, and closely followed by the dinner 
 party. A rat is a poor performer on a staircase, 
 and, at the door leading into the turf-house, the 
 dogs seemed to be on top of him. The bolt-hole 
 under the door, that his own teeth had prepared, 
 gave him an instant of advantage ; Flurry had 
 the door open in a second, someone snatched the 
 passage lamp from the wall, but it was obviously 
 six to four on the rat. 
 
 The turf-house was a large space at the very 
 root of the house, vaulted and mysterious, bear- 
 ing Shreelane on its back like the tortoise that 
 supports the world. Barrels draped with cob- 
 webs stood along one wall, but the rat was not 
 behind them, and Minx and her family drove like 
 hawks into a corner, in which, beneath a chaotic 
 heap of broken furniture and household debris, 
 the rat had gone to ground. We followed, tread- 
 ing softly in the turf-mould of unnumbered winters. 
 We tore out the furniture, which yielded itself in 
 fragments ; the delirium of the terriers mounting 
 with each crash, and being, if possible, enhanced 
 by the well-meant but intolerable efforts of the 
 red setter to assist them. Finally we worked 
 down to an old door, lying on its face on some- 
 thing that raised it a few inches from the ground. 
 
 151 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 " Now ! Mind yourselves ! " said Flurry, 
 heaving up the door and flinging it back against 
 the wall. 
 
 The rat bolted gallantly, and darted into an 
 old box, of singular shape, that lay, half open, 
 among the debris, and there, in a storm of tattered 
 paper, met his fate. Minx jumped out of the 
 box very deliberately, with the rat across her 
 jaws, and a scarlet bite in her white muzzle. 
 With frozen calm, and a menacing eye directed 
 at the red setter, she laid it on the turf mould, 
 and stiffly withdrew. Her son and daughter 
 advanced in turn, smelt it respectfully and retired. 
 There was no swagger ; all complied with the 
 ritual of fox-terrier form laid down for such 
 occasions. 
 
 I was then for the first time aware that the 
 ladies, in all the glitter and glory of their evening 
 dresses, had each mounted herself upon a barrel ; 
 in the theatrical gloom of the vaulted turf-house, 
 they suggested the resurrection of Ali Baba's 
 Forty Thieves. 
 
 ** Look where he had his nest in among the 
 old letters ! " said Flurry to Philippa, as she de- 
 scended from her barrel to felicitate Minx and to 
 condole with the rat. ** That box came out of the 
 rumble of an old coach, the Lord knows when ! '* 
 
 "There's some sort of a ring in the floor 
 152 
 
Major dApollo ^^iggs 
 
 here," said Andrew, who was rooting with a 
 rusty crowbar in the turf-mould where the door 
 had lain. *' Bring the light, someone " 
 
 The lamp revealed a large iron ring which was 
 fixed in a flat stone ; we scraped away the turf- 
 mould and found that the stone was fastened 
 down with an iron bar, passing through a staple 
 at either end, and padlocked. 
 
 "As long as I'm in this place," said Flurry, 
 '* I never saw this outfit before." 
 
 " There's a seal over the keyhole," said Andrew, 
 turning over the padlock. 
 
 "That means it was not intended it should be 
 opened," said Meg Longmuir quickly. 
 
 I looked round, and, bad as the light was, I 
 thought her face looked pale. 
 
 Andrew did not answer her. He poised the 
 crowbar scientifically, and drove it at the padlock. 
 It broke at the second blow, releasing the bar. 
 
 "No trouble about that ! " he said, addressing 
 himself to the gallery, and not looking at Miss 
 Longmuir. " Now, then, shall we have the flag 
 up?" 
 
 There were only two dissentients ; one was 
 Flurry, who put his hands in his pockets, and 
 said he wasn't going to destroy his best evening 
 pants ; the other was Miss Longmuir, who said 
 that to break an old seal like that was to break 
 
 153 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 luck. She also looked at Andrew in a way that 
 should have gone far to redress the injuries 
 inflicted during dinner. Apparently it did not 
 suffice. Captain Larpent firmly inserted the end 
 of the bar under the edge of the flag. Bernard 
 Shute took hold of the ring. 
 
 "All together!" said Andrew. 
 
 There was a moment of efl'ort, the flag came 
 up abruptly, and, as abruptly, Bernard sat down 
 in the turf-mould with the flag between his legs. 
 The crowbar slipped forward, and vanished with 
 a hollow-sounding splash down a black chasm ; 
 Andrew, thrown ofl" his balance, also slipped 
 forward, and would have followed it, head first, 
 had not Flurry and I caught him. 
 
 The chasm was a well, nearly full ; the water 
 twinkled at us, impenetrably black ; it made me 
 think of the ink in the hollowed palm of a native 
 who had told my fortune, up at Peshawur. 
 
 " That was about as near as makes no differ- 
 ence! "said Bernard. "You've cut your cheek, 
 Larpent." 
 
 ''Have I?" said Andrew vaguely, putting up 
 a rather shaky hand to his face. *' I think my 
 head took the edge of the well." 
 
 We covered the hole with the old door, and 
 Andrew was taken away to have his wound 
 attended to. It was not a severe wound, but the 
 
 154 
 
Major <*Apollo ^^^gs 
 
 process was lengthy, and involved die collabora- 
 tion of all the ladies. It seemed to the three 
 neglected males, waiting for a fourth to play 
 bridge, that this mobilisation of ministering 
 angels was somewhat overdone. 
 
 Andrew came down to breakfast next morning 
 with a headache, and said he had slept badly. 
 Had he discovered the source of the Nile in 
 the turf-house the night before, my wife and 
 Miss Lonormuir could not have been more adula- 
 tory and sympathetic, nor could the projects, based 
 upon the discovery, have been more ambitious. I 
 went forth to my work and to my labour without 
 so much as a dog to wave me farewell ; all were 
 in the turf-house, surrounded by visionary force- 
 pumps, bath-rooms, and even by miraged fountains 
 in the garden. 
 
 When I drove the car into the yard on my 
 return that afternoon, I was confronted by a long 
 chestnut face with a white blaze, looking at me 
 out of the spare loose- box — the face, in fact, of 
 "the little horse" of whom Flurry had spoken 
 to Andrew. There was also, added to the more 
 familiar heaps of mortar, gravel, and stones, a 
 considerable deposit of black and evil-smelling 
 sludge. It seemed, as was not uncommonly the 
 case, that a good many things had been happen- 
 ing during my absence. The stone floor of the 
 
 155 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 hall was stencilled with an intricate pattern of 
 black paw-marks, and was further decorated with 
 scraps of torn paper ; a cold stench pervaded the 
 smoking-room (which was situated above the 
 turf-house) ; far away, a sound as of a gramophone 
 in the next world indicated that Captain Andrew's 
 affaire de coeur was finding an outlet in song. 
 
 I followed the sounds to the drawing-room, and 
 found Andrew and Miss Longmuir at the piano, 
 in a harmony obviously world-forgetting, though 
 not likely to be by the world forgot. Philippa 
 was sitting by the oil stove, and was, I hope, 
 deriving some satisfaction from inhaling its fumes, 
 its effect upon the temperature being negligible. 
 
 Andrew's song was a Hungarian ditty, truculent 
 and amorous, and very loud ; under cover of it 
 my wife told me that he, assisted by Walkin' 
 Aisy and the quarrymen, and attended by Miss 
 Longmuir, had baled out the newly discovered 
 well, and that the quarrymen had exacted whisky 
 to sustain them during the later stages of the 
 process, and that the sludge would be ideal for 
 the roses. They believed the well was filling 
 again beautifully, but they had to leave it be- 
 cause Flurry came over with the horse for Andrew 
 for the paper-chase, and Andrew and Meg went 
 out schooling. 
 
 ** What paper-chase ? *' I interpolated coldly. 
 156 
 
Major Apollo ^^iggs 
 
 " Oh, they've got one up for Monday," said 
 Philippa airily. ** The children have been tearing 
 up paper all day. I found — rather with horror — 
 that Flurry had given them those old letters out 
 of the turf-house to tear up — I said you and I 
 would ride, of course " — she looked at me with 
 apprehension veiled by defiance, and I said it 
 was thoughtful of her. — ** But I want to tell you 
 about old Mrs. Knox," she said, hurrying on. 
 *' She told Flurry that the well had never been 
 used since the time of the Famine, when they 
 got up a soup-kitchen here, and the day after they 
 opened the well she said the servants flew in a 
 body out of the house, like wild geese ! " 
 
 ** I don't wonder, if it smelt as it does now," I 
 said. ** Was that why they flew ? " 
 
 " Flurry said he didn't know what lifted them. 
 But Flurry never says he doesn't know unless he 
 does know and doesn't want to tell ! " 
 
 The following day was Saturday, and for the 
 first time for many weeks a Sabbath stillness 
 prevailed on the roof. Walkin' Aisy was absent ; 
 no explanation was forthcoming, and I diagnosed 
 a funeral in the neighbourhood. It was on 
 Sunday afternoon that I was roused from my 
 usual meditation — consequent upon Sunday roast 
 beef — by the intelligence that Mrs. William 
 Shanahan wanted to speak to me. Mrs. Shanahan 
 
 157 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 was a fair freckled woman, with a loud voice and 
 a red face and the reputation of ruling Walkin 
 Aisy with a rod of iron. It appeared that 
 Walkin' Aisy was confined to his bed ; that he 
 had had a reel in his head after getting home 
 on Friday, and that whatever work it was that 
 young gentleman gave him to do, he wasn't the 
 better of it. 
 
 **And he was as wake in himself and as 
 troubled in his mind as that he couldn't walk to 
 Mass. I told him he should mind the chickens 
 while I'd be out, and when I came in the dog 
 had three of me chickens dead on the floor, and 
 where was himself, only back in the room, and 
 he kneeling there with the two hands up, sayin' 
 his prayers! * What ails ye?' says I, * ye old 
 gommoch, that ye'd let the dog kill me chickens ? ' 
 * Sure, I was say in' me prayers,' says he ; * That 
 the Lord mightn't hear your prayers ! ' says I. 
 God forgive me, I had to say it ! " 
 
 I recalled her to the question of the chimneys, 
 pointing out that the gable chimney was half 
 down, and could not be left as it was. 
 
 To this Mrs. Walkin' Aisy replied at great 
 length that William's father had given him an 
 advice not to go in it, and that the father was 
 dark these scores of years, and it was what he 
 blamed for it was the work he done in Shreelane 
 
 158 
 
Major aApollo %tggs 
 
 House in the time of the Famine. It was after 
 that the sight went bandy with him. 
 
 She declined to offer any opinion as to when 
 Walkin' Aisy would return to work, and withdrew, 
 leaving me to consider my position under the 
 Employers* Liability Act in the event of her 
 husband's demise, and to wish, not for the first 
 time, that Andrew (now strolling at his ease with 
 Miss Longmuir, reviewing a course for the paper- 
 chase), had been at Jericho, or any other resort of 
 the superfluous, before he interfered with the tran- 
 quil progress of the chimneys towards dissolution. 
 
 There were strange lapses at dinner, — delays, 
 omissions, disasters, and Julia the parlourmaid 
 had a trembling hand and a general suggestion 
 of nerve-storm. After dinner it was reported to 
 Philippa that Anthony was not well, and after a 
 prolonged absence she returned with the informa- 
 tion that he had had a nightmare, and that there 
 was a rumour in the house that all the servants 
 were going to give warning the following morn- 
 ing. Their reason for this was obscure, but was 
 somehow connected with Mrs. Walkin' Aisy's 
 visit, and the fact that the swing-door leading to 
 the turf-house had opened and shut twice, of its 
 own volition. We did not mention these matters 
 to our guests, and retired to rest in perturbation. 
 I admit that at some time during the night, which 
 
 159 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 was a still one, I heard the turf-house door groan 
 on its hinges, and slam. I went downstairs and 
 found nothing ; it was certainly unusual, however, 
 that Bob, the red setter, had abandoned his lair 
 in the smoking-room, and was spending the night 
 on the mat outside my dressing-room door. 
 
 Next morning Philippa, considering that a thrust 
 was better than a parry, held a court of enquiry 
 in the lower regions, and, according to her own 
 report, spoke seriously on the grave responsibility 
 incurred by those who frightened other people 
 about nonsense. Julia's version of the proceed- 
 ings, I heard at a later date. She said that ** the 
 Misthress spoke to us lovely, and the Priest 
 couldn't speak better than her. She told us that 
 the divils in hell wasn't worse than us." 
 
 Part III 
 
 It has been said of Ireland that the inevitable 
 never happens, and that the impossible invariably 
 occurs. When on Monday morning I learned 
 that Flurry was to be one of the hares, and beheld 
 him mounted on his best horse, as covered with 
 bags as a postman on Christmas Day, I recalled 
 the epigram. Another confirmation of the law 
 of the unexpected was the fact that Meg Long- 
 muir, on the " maroan " pony, was his fellow 
 
 i6o 
 
Major aApollo '^^iggs 
 
 hare, very smart, much elated, and quite unaware 
 that she had been substituted for Sally Knox at 
 the last moment, in order that she might be as a 
 millstone hung round the neck of Flurry. That 
 this arrangement was not what Captain Larpent 
 had desired was sufficiently apparent to the naked 
 eye : why Flurry submitted to it was less obvious. 
 About a dozen riders had been whipped up to 
 take part in this preposterous affair, and were 
 standing about on the grass in front of Shreelane, 
 cutting up the turf as much as the hardness of 
 the ground would permit, and making as much 
 noise as a pack of hounds at feeding time. The 
 April sun glared hot, the better part of a north- 
 easterly gale was blowing, the horses had over- 
 eaten themselves with the bread of idleness, and 
 were fat and frisky. 
 
 '' Is he any good .?" said Flurry to me in a low 
 voice, with his eye on Andrew, who was sitting, 
 shrouded in gloom and remoteness, on the chest- 
 nut horse. 
 
 '*Ask Miss Longmuir," I said. "She was 
 schooling with him on Saturday." 
 
 " I'll have plenty to do minding her, without 
 asking her questions that she couldn't answer," re- 
 turned Flurry. He resumed his survey of Andrew 
 '' I wonder will he be able to hold that horse in a 
 snaffle } He catches hold an odd time." 
 
 l6l T 
 
In Mr. Knox 5 Country 
 
 ** Stand by!" said Doctor Hickey, his watch 
 in his hand. ** Fifteen seconds more before the 
 hares start ! " 
 
 **Well, if Larpent goes as big as he talks, 
 he'll do," said Flurry, gathering up his reins. 
 
 The ten minutes of grace ebbed slowly away, 
 and preposterous though I still held the affair to 
 be, I do not deny that I was aware of an inward 
 simmering of impatience. 
 
 ** ril have the face worn off my watch looking 
 at it if you don't let us start soon ! " said Miss 
 Larkie McRory to Hickey. 
 
 She was mounted on a long-legged animal that 
 had been summarised by Flurry as "the latter 
 end of a car-horse," and was certainly in need of 
 all the time it could get. 
 
 ** Don't excite yourself now, or I'll be having 
 to order you a cooling draught ! " returned the 
 Doctor, but I perceived that he, in common with 
 everyone else, was edging his horse towards the 
 point of departure. 
 "Go!" 
 
 In the riot of the break-away, I was able to 
 think of nothing but of keeping Daniel from 
 bucking me over his head, but during the hustle 
 at the avenue gates I observed Andrew riding 
 off Bernard, and getting to the front with pale 
 and ferocious determination. The ** scent" took 
 
 162 
 
Major (Apollo ^'ggs 
 
 us along the road ; we followed it over a stony 
 bank and across two fields, at steeplechase pace, 
 and then it ceased. By this time any lingering 
 sense of absurdity had ceased also. We cast 
 ourselves feverishly, like hounds ; we galloped 
 great circles ; someone found the paper again, 
 and yelled like a maniac. We all yelled in 
 response, a variety of yells, from " Tally Ho " to 
 " Cooee," as, like Bedlam let loose, we rushed to 
 the discoverer. We were up on high land now, 
 and the wind was whirling in our ears, snatching 
 our voices away to infinity, and blowing up the 
 temperatures of horses and riders like a bellows. 
 It had caught away the torn paper and flung it to 
 leeward, into furze brakes, against the sides of 
 the banks, and checks were many, and the horses, 
 convinced that the hounds were somewhere 
 ahead, pulled double. In the bare fields, with 
 their scanty April grass, everything showed up ; 
 we were deceived by white stones, by daisies, by 
 dandelion puff-balls, by goose-feathers; most of 
 all we were deceived by country-people, whom, 
 I have no doubt. Flurry had instructed to mis- 
 lead us. 
 
 We had had a long check, consequent on a 
 false trail, when, three fields away, Andrew held 
 up his hat. 
 
 ** Look at him now, running mute ! " giggled 
 163 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 Sally Knox in my ear, as we battered down a 
 road. ''He's too cross to shout. He's frantic 
 because he's not the hare, and Meg Longmuir 
 was sent with Flurry ! And poor Flurry, who's 
 going such a nice safe line ! " 
 
 " I suppose we may thank Miss Longmuir for 
 the safe line.-* " I responded with some difficulty, 
 because Daniel was enjoying himself on the road, 
 according to the idiotic manner of horses. 
 
 " No ! You may thank the chestnut horse ! ** 
 ejaculated Flurry Knox's wife, as she hoisted 
 out of the road over a loose wall. 
 
 Remembering that Andrew was intended to 
 buy the chestnut horse, the deduction was a 
 simple one. It was also quite clear that, dis- 
 appointing as it might be, and contrary to the 
 most cherished convention, Andrew was going 
 as big as he talked, and even bigger. 
 
 " * Them that's in love is like no one ' ! " I 
 quoted to Mrs. Flurry, as Captain Larpent, 
 taking the shortest way to a drift of paper on 
 a hillside, charged a tall, furze-tufted fence, and 
 got over with a scramble. We followed, less 
 heroically, by a gap, and ascended the hill, with 
 the torn paper scurrying in front of us in the gusty 
 wind. We had now been going for thirty-five 
 minutes, and were all, horses and riders, something 
 blown ; Miss Larkie's car-horse could have been 
 
 164 
 
Major aApollo "^^vggs 
 
 heard down-wind for half a mile, and I would have 
 backed Daniel to out-roar any lion in the den. 
 
 Nothing but the checks held us together. 
 Doctor Hickey, and Irving, the District Inspec- 
 tor, were taking the matter seriously, and were 
 riding hard to catch Andrew, for the honour of 
 the country. Bernard Shute and two or three 
 other heavy-weights were afoot, dragging their 
 dripping horses over a bank with an up-hill take 
 off; Miss McRory and the car-horse were making 
 an extremely gradual progress in the rear, and 
 Philippa had pulled back to give her leads, with 
 an unselfishness that was not only futile, but was 
 also a reproach to me and my fellow-men. 
 
 We had been going in a big ring, and from 
 the top of the hill we could again see Shreelane, 
 below us among its trees. It was there also 
 that we caught the first sight of the hares, now 
 heading for home and safety. The wind had 
 strengthened to half a gale, and the wild and 
 composite yell with which the hounds viewed 
 their quarry was blown back into their throats. 
 The maroan pony had fulfilled her mission as a 
 handicap ; twice we saw Flurry dismount and pull 
 down a gap ; once, at a bank, he got behind her 
 and whipped her over like a peg-top. Another 
 field took them to the high road. A puff of 
 white paper fluttered out, and Miss Longmuir 
 
 165 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 looked back and flourished a defiant whip ; they 
 turned, and galloped in a cloud of dust along 
 the road for Shreelane. 
 
 It was not a nice hill to get down in a hurry, 
 and I should think the chestnut horse dreams 
 of it now, somewhere in the level English Mid- 
 lands, after he has over-eaten himself on fat 
 English oats. For my part, I remembered a 
 humble but useful path, that links a little group 
 of cottages with the rest of the world. 
 
 The paper lay thick on the road in the shelter 
 of the fences ; everyone began to ride for a 
 finish, and after a quarter of a mile of pounding 
 in the dust at the heel of the hunt, I considered 
 that Daniel and I had satisfied the demands of 
 honour, and ignobly turned in at the back way 
 to the stable yard, permitting the chase to sweep 
 on to the front gates without me. 
 
 In the stable yard I found several objects of 
 interest. The hares were there, dismounted, 
 very hot, and uncaptured ; Mrs. Knox was there, 
 seated in her phaeton ; there was a cluster of 
 servants at the back door ; there were McRorys, 
 leaning on bicycles ; there was Cecilia Shute, in 
 her motor, with unknown rank and fashion bil- 
 lowing in motor veils beside her. 
 
 All were gazing at a mass of sooty bricks and 
 shattered chimney-pots that lay, scattered wide, 
 
 1 66 
 
Major (Apollo 1(iggs 
 in and about the black dredgings of the turf- 
 house well. 
 
 *' That's the gable chimney," said Flurry coolly ; 
 " it got tired of waiting for Walkin' Aisy. We 
 heard the roar of it as we came in the front 
 gate! " He turned his mail-bag upside down so 
 that its ultimate dregs were blown far and wide. 
 
 " How did the chestnut horse go with ? " 
 
 As if in reply, hoofs clattered outside the yard, 
 and the white nose of the chestnut shot into 
 the opening of the yard gate. He plunged past 
 me, with Andrew lying back and tugging at^ the 
 snaffle. The Shreelane yard was fairly spacious, 
 but I began to think that the thing wasn't as 
 funny as it looked. The horse swerved at Mrs. 
 Knox's phaeton, swerved again as Flurry turned 
 him from his stable door with a flourish of the 
 mail-bag. Andrew wrenched his head straight 
 for the open back gate, and might have got 
 him out without disaster, had not the widespread 
 ruin of the chimney intervened. The chestnut 
 once more tried to swerve, his legs went from 
 under him, and he fell, striking fire from the 
 cobble stones of the yard. Andrew stuck to 
 him to the last instant, but was shot clear, and 
 was flung, head first, into the heap of stones 
 and black mud. 
 
 167 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 It seemed long, long hours between this cata- 
 strophe, and a sufficient subsidence of things in 
 general, for me to be able, without inhumanity, 
 to envisage a whisky and soda. Old Mrs. Knox 
 watched me with approval. 
 
 ** I'm tired of looking at young men drinking 
 tea," she commented. (It was Mrs. Knox's pleas- 
 ing idiosyncrasy to look upon me as a young man.) 
 " They were like a pack of curates at a school- 
 feast ! Not that I was ever at a school-feast, thank 
 God ! " she added, with an abandoned chuckle. 
 
 We were sitting in a corner of the dining-room, 
 surrounded by empty cups and crumby plates; 
 tides of tea and of talkers had ebbed and flowed, 
 but Mrs. Knox had sat on — to hear my personal 
 report of Andrew, she said. 
 
 **Upon my honour, he escaped very well! A 
 dislocated shoulder is nothing, and the young lady 
 is there to ' tend the wounded Deloraine ! ' " 
 
 She paused, and put her head on one side, as 
 if waiting for the prompter. '' How does it go} 
 ' She thought some spirit of the sky had done the 
 bold mosstrooper wrong ! ' " 
 
 She paused again, and looked at me ; the even- 
 ing light shone on her spectacles, and made them 
 impenetrable. 
 
 *' Now I'm going to give you a piece of advice ; 
 • And I'll not take it ! ' says Major Yeates, R.M. ! " 
 
 i68 
 
Major aApollo '^^iggs 
 
 I protested that I had said nothing of the kind. 
 She prodded me in the knee with a goblin finger. 
 
 " Close that well! Put on the flagstone, and 
 seal it down again ! " She fumbled in her shawls, 
 and pulled out a thin old gold chain. ** Here's 
 the seal, the same one that my father sealed it 
 with at the time of the Famine ! " 
 
 I said that I was ready to do anything that she 
 told me, but it would be interesting to know why. 
 
 Mrs. Knox detached the seal from her chain, to 
 which it was knotted by something that I darkly 
 suspected to be a bit of bootlace. It was a cor- 
 nelian seal, made in the grand manner ; massively 
 wrought, the gold smooth from age. 
 
 *' I daresay you never heard of Major Apollo 
 Riggs? He drove up to this house one fine day 
 in a coach-and-four. Next day the coach-and- 
 four drove away, but Major Apollo Riggs was 
 not in it! " 
 
 " He found himself a success at Shreelane?" I 
 suggested. 
 
 *' Not so much with his host as his hostess!" 
 returned Mrs. Knox portentously. 
 
 *' A duel ? " I asked. 
 
 ** He was never seen again, my dear! " replied 
 Mrs. Knox. (There are moments, in Ireland, 
 when this term of affection is used not so much 
 affectionately as confidentially.) 
 
 169 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 At this point the door opened. Mrs. Knox 
 put the goblin finger on her Hps, as Philippa, 
 still in her habit, slid into the room. 
 
 " The patient and Meg are extremely self- 
 sufficing," she said, dropping into a chair. ** His 
 face is turning all colours of the rainbow, and one 
 eye has disappeared, but the other is full of ex- 
 pression and is fixed on Meg ! " 
 
 ** There's not much colour about youj' I said. 
 ** You ought to have a whisky and soda." 
 
 ** Nonsense ! " said Philippa, waving me away ; 
 ** we've got most of the black stuff out of his hair ; 
 even his waistcoat pocket was full of it ! And 
 bits of the torn paper had stuck to it, like 
 confetti." 
 
 ** That suggests a wedding," I observed. 
 
 *' Quite," said Philippa. ** But the absurd thing 
 was that one of the confetti — obviously a bit of 
 those old letters that the children tore up — had 
 the word 'Apollo' on it ! It was stuck on to 
 him like a label." 
 
 Mrs. Knox clasped her hands, and lay back in 
 her chair. 
 
 ** I said it was, of course, a tribute to his beauty, 
 but Meg was not at all amused. She thought it 
 was ' lese majestd! " 
 
 ** She'll get over that in time," I said, putting 
 the seal in my pocket. 
 
 170 
 

 James. 
 
VII 
 
 WHEN I FIRST MET DR. HICKEY 
 
 There was a wonderful chandelier in the hotel 
 dining-room. Fine bronze it was made of, with 
 mermaids, and Tritons, and dolphins flourishing 
 their tails up towards the dingy ceiling-paper, 
 and beaked galleys, on whose prows sat six small 
 lamps, with white china receptacles for paraffin, 
 and smoky brown chimneys. Gone were the 
 brave days when each prow had borne a galaxy 
 of tall wax candles ; the chandelier might con- 
 sider itself lucky in that it had even the paraffin 
 lamps to justify its existence, and that it still 
 hung from a ceiling, instead of sharing the last 
 resting-place of its twin brother, in the bed of the 
 tidal river under the hotel windows. 
 
 James, the hotel waiter, knew the family 
 history of the chandelier, as he knew that of most 
 people and things in the county. I commented 
 upon it to a young gentleman with a pointed 
 beard, who sat next to me at dinner, and said 
 that it looked to me like Renaissance. The 
 young gentleman suggested, alternatively, that it 
 looked more like bronze. I did not dispute the 
 
 171 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 point, but I think he found the subject precarious, 
 as he turned to the young lady on his left, and I 
 heard him embark upon a new theme. 
 
 ** I was half dead with the toothache all day," 
 he observed. 
 
 The young lady replied sympathetically that 
 toothache was a fright. 
 
 *' Well, indeed, that's true," said James, 
 smoothly entering the conversation from behind 
 my chair. '* I got my own share of it. Sure 
 there was one time I used to be roaring like a 
 Banshee all night with it." 
 
 " Were you so ? " said the gentleman, with a 
 wink at me. '' That must have been a long 
 time ago, James." 
 
 *' Well, indeed, it is too. Doctor," replied James 
 meditatively, ''going on forty years, I daresay. 
 I went to Dublin, and I went to a great dentist 
 that was in it that time, and he pulled all the 
 teeth I had, and he gave me a new set entirely." 
 
 ** Oh, my ! " said the young lady, ** that must 
 have been very expensive." 
 
 " It was so," said James, not without pride. 
 " Twenty pounds I gave him." 
 
 ** That was awful," said the young lady, feel- 
 ingly ; '' it was well to be you that had it to 
 spend." 
 
 "Well, it wasn't all out so bad," said James; 
 172 
 
When I First Met Dr. Hickey 
 
 " sure I only wore them a few times — I wouldn't 
 be bothered with them, and a doctor that was a 
 friend of mine gave me ten pounds for them." 
 
 ** I suppose they were a fit for a patient of 
 his ? " said the doctor. 
 
 ** They were a bad fit for me, anyway," re- 
 turned James, glancing over his shoulder at the 
 clattering operations of his two female sub- 
 ordinates, with the eye of the sergeant-major — 
 the eye that always contains a grievance. ** I 
 was a footman with the old Lord Garretmore 
 that time. Sure that was where the chandelier 
 came from. A grand house it was, too — big 
 slobs of marble on the tables, and gold legs 
 under them, and ye'd bog to the knees in the 
 carpets. Well, it was the first night after me 
 getting the teeth, there was a gentleman stayed 
 for dinner, and he was to go away by the night 
 train. Forty horses were in the stables, and 
 there wasn't one but was out at grass, and I 
 had to go out beating the bushes for an old 
 mare that was round the house always, herself 
 and her foal, to put her under the side car. 
 * Prua ! Prua ! ' says I, calling the mare in the 
 dark, and with that the teeth lepped out of my 
 mouth, with respects to you ! " 
 
 ** Oh, fie ! " said the mother of the young 
 lady. 
 
 173 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 *' What did you do then, James?" inquired the 
 Doctor. 
 
 ** I took the white tie off me, and I tied it to 
 the bush that was next me, for a token, and 
 'twas that way I got them again the next morn- 
 ing, thanks be to God." 
 
 Having concluded his story, James started on 
 a perfunctory tour of the table with the wine 
 card. He stopped to pull the turf fire together, 
 and, with a furtive eye at the glass over the 
 chimney-piece, he rearranged the long lock of 
 hair that draped his bald pate. It was dyed, 
 of that peculiar shade of chestnut that disdains 
 subterfuge, and the fact and its suggestions were 
 distressing where an old servant was concerned ; 
 so also was the manner in which he hobbled on 
 his heels. 
 
 ** His walk's full of corns," said the young 
 doctor, eyeing him not without sympathy. "He's 
 a great old character. I believe they keep him 
 here to talk to the tourists." 
 
 It is a melancholy fact that in Ireland, in these 
 later days, ** characters " have become aware of 
 their position, and palpably live up to their repu- 
 tation. But James was in a class of his own. 
 
 I said didactically, even combatively, that 
 ** characters " were free and easy, but that James 
 was easy without being free. 
 
 174 
 
When I First Met Dr, Hickey 
 
 ** I'll bet he's not easy in his feet, anyhow!" 
 said the Doctor brutally. ** Have you any more 
 soup there, James ? " 
 
 The mother of the young lady, who had hither- 
 to preserved a silence, broken only by the audible 
 assimilation of her soup, here laid down her spoon 
 and said in cryptic disparagement : 
 
 *'Tin!" 
 
 **Well, I'd say it was the best we had yet," 
 said the Doctor. " I'd undertake to pull a puppy 
 through distemper with it." 
 
 ** That's the soup she has always for th'assizes," 
 said James. '* Grand soup it is, and I declare to 
 ye, she makes it out of ^^^ shells and every old 
 rubbish ! " 
 
 The young lady's mother emitted a short laugh, 
 but her empty soup-plate told heavily against 
 her. 
 
 The meal wore slowly on. A sea fish, of a 
 genus unknown to me, and amazingly endowed 
 with bones, was consumed in distracted silence. 
 
 *' I hear you have a fish shop opened in Balli- 
 nagar, Mrs. M'Evoy," remarked the Doctor, 
 taking his last fish bone out of action with pro- 
 fessional adroitness, and addressing the mother 
 of the young lady, "That's very up-to-date. 
 There wasn't one I met from Ballinagar but was 
 bragging of it." 
 
 175 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 " It was the Hoolahanes that had it," said Mrs. 
 M'Evoy. '* It's closed." 
 
 " Oh dear, why so } " said the Doctor. '' Why 
 did they do that, I wonder } " 
 
 ** They said that morning, noon, and night 
 people were bothering them for fish," returned 
 Mrs. M'Evoy, to whom this triumph of the 
 artistic temperament presented no exceptional 
 feature. 
 
 '' Unless it might be on a fast day, I'd never 
 ask to taste a bit of fish,*' remarked James, giving 
 a helping hand to the conversation. "There 
 was a man I knew from this place got his death 
 in Liverpool from a bit of fish. It stuck to the 
 upper gum. ' Bill,' says he to the one that was 
 with him, * so help me God,' says he, * I'm dyin',' 
 says he ; and sure that's how he met his death ! 
 It was in some grand hotel he was, and he was 
 too shy to give the puff to send out the bit." 
 
 ^Td like to send that to the 'B.M.J.'," said 
 the Doctor gravely. "■ Maybe you could give 
 me the man's name, James ? " 
 
 ** There was them that could swear to it," said 
 James, depositing a syphon on the table in a 
 determined manner, " but they were before your 
 day, Doctor Hickey." 
 
 ** How young he is!" said Miss M'Evoy 
 archly. ** Don't be flattering him, James." 
 
 176 
 
When I First Met Dr. Hickey 
 
 " Indeed I'll not flatter him," returned James, 
 '* there's plenty doing that." 
 
 It was at about this point that a dish containing 
 three roast ducks was placed in front of me. 
 Circumstances had decreed that I sat at the end 
 of the table ; it was my task to deal with the 
 ducks, and during the breathless and steamy 
 struggle that ensued, I passed out of the con- 
 versation, which, indeed, had resolved itself into 
 a more personal affair between Dr. Hickey and 
 Miss M'Evoy. 
 
 It was somewhere in the reposeful period that 
 came with the cheese, that Dr. Hickey ordered a 
 bottle of port, of which he very handsomely in- 
 vited the ladies and me to partake. He leaned 
 back in his chair. 
 
 ** Was this in the cellar the time of the flood ? " 
 he said, putting down his glass. *' I don't mean 
 Noah's flood, James ; you mightn't remember 
 that ; but the time the river came up in the town 
 here." 
 
 " If it was Noah's flood itself," said James, 
 instantly accepting combat, " it couldn't get into 
 our cellars. But, faith, it was up in this room 
 you're sitting in, and I had to get up on the table 
 from it, and it ruz to the table, and I had to hang 
 out of the chandelier, and a boat came into the 
 room then and took me out. Sure that was the 
 
 177 M 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 time that the porpoise came up the river, with 
 the dint of the flood, and she was in it for a week, 
 in front of the hotel." 
 
 ** In compliment to the visitors, I suppose?" 
 said the Doctor. "And what happened her, 
 James?" 
 
 '' She was in it till a whale came up the river," 
 replied James, with the simplicity of Holy Writ, 
 " and b'Jove he banished her ! " 
 
 " It's a wonder you'd let him treat a lady that 
 way, James," said Dr. Hickey. 
 
 It was still twilight when we left the dining- 
 room, and strayed to the open hall door, and out 
 into the September evening. In the east a rose- 
 pink moon was rising in lavender haze, and a 
 faint wind blew from it ; the subtle east wind of 
 September, warmed by its journey across the 
 cornfields, turf-scented by the bogs. There was 
 a narrow garden between the hotel and the river, 
 a place where were new and already-neglected 
 flower-beds, and paths heavy with coarse river 
 gravel, and grass that had been cut, not too 
 recendy, with a scythe. A thatched summer- 
 house completed the spasmodic effort of the 
 hotel to rise to smartness. The West of Ireland 
 cannot be smart, nor should any right-minded 
 person desire that it should be so. 
 
 Dr. Hickey and I sat and smoked on the 
 178 
 
JVhen I First Met Dr. Hickey 
 
 parapet wall above the river, while the slated and 
 whitewashed town darkened into mystery. Little 
 lights came slowly out, and behind the town the 
 grey shape of Dreelish mountain lowered in un- 
 compromising abruptness, a brooding presence, 
 felt rather than seen. In the summer-house 
 James was lighting a Chinese lantern, of a 
 somewhat crumpled and rheumatic outline. 
 
 " Well, now, that's a great notion ! " said 
 Dr. Hickey, with the lethargic and pessi- 
 mistic humour of his type. ** That'll be in the 
 prospectus — ' Hotel grounds illuminated every 
 night.' I wonder did they buy that at the 
 Jumble Sale after the Fancy Fair in the Town 
 Hall?" 
 
 We sat there, and the moon and the round 
 red Chinese lantern looked at each other across 
 the evening, and had a certain resemblance, and 
 I reflected on the fact that an Irishman is always 
 the critic in the stalls, and is also, in spirit, 
 behind the scenes. 
 
 *' Look at James now," said the Doctor. 
 ** He's inviting the ladies out to have coffee in 
 the summer-house. That's very fashionable. I 
 suppose we should go there too." 
 
 We sat with Mrs. and Miss M'Evoy in the 
 summer-house, and drank something that was 
 unearthly black in the red light, and was singu- 
 
 179 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 larly unsuggestive of coffee. The seats were 
 what Is known as "rustic," and had aggressive 
 knobs in unexpected places ; the floor held the 
 invincible dampness of the West, yet the situation 
 was not disagreeable. At the other side of the 
 river men were sitting on a wall, and talking, 
 quietly, Inexhaustibly ; now and then a shout of 
 lauofhter broke from one of them, like a flame 
 from a smouldering fire. 
 
 ** These lads are waiting to go back on the 
 night m.ail," said the Doctor; **you wouldn't 
 think they're up since maybe three this morning 
 to come in to the fair." 
 
 Here a railway whistle made a thin bar of 
 sound somewhere out under the low moon, that 
 had now lifted herself clear of the haze. A voice 
 called from the hill-side : 
 
 **Hora-thu! Tommeen! Let yee be coming 
 
 on ! 
 
 The men tumbled on to the road, and hurried, 
 heavy-footed, in the direction of the station. 
 
 '' Sure, they've half an hour yet, the creatures," 
 said Mrs. M'Evoy. 
 
 ''They have, and maybe an hour before they 
 have the pigs shunted," said James, re-entering 
 with a plate of biscuits, adorned with pink and 
 white sugar. 
 
 " Ah ! what signifies half an hour here or there 
 i8o 
 
When I First Met Dr. Hickey 
 
 on this line!" said Dr. Hickey. "I'm told 
 there was a lady travelling on it last week, and 
 she had a canary in a cage, and the canary got 
 loose and flew out of the window, and by George, 
 the lady pulled the communication cord, and 
 stopped the train ! " 
 
 '* Well, now, she showed her sense,'* said Mrs. 
 M'Evoy, with an utterance slightly muffled in 
 pink biscuit. 
 
 ** She and the guard went then trying to 
 catch the canary," continued Dr. Hickey, *'and 
 he'd sit till they'd get near him, and then he'd 
 fly on another piece. Everyone that was in the 
 train was hanging out of it, and betting on it, 
 from one carriage to another, and some would 
 back the lady and some would back the bird, 
 and everyone telling them what to do." 
 
 **It's a pity you weren't in it," said Miss 
 M'Evoy, ** they'd have been all right then." 
 
 ** It was that bare bit of bog near Bohirmeen," 
 pursued Dr. Hickey, without a stagger, **not a 
 tree in it. * If he have a fly left in him at all,' 
 says a chap out of a Third Smoker, ' ye'll get 
 him in Mike Doogan's bush.' That was the 
 only bush in the country." 
 
 ** 'Twas true for him," said James. 
 
 ** Well, they got him in the bush," proceeded 
 Dr. Hickey, "singing away for himself; but 
 
 i8i 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 they had some trouble crossing the drains. I'm 
 told the guard said the lady lepped like a 
 horse ! " 
 
 "You had it right, all to the singing," com- 
 mented Mrs. M^Evoy, advancing as it were to 
 the foodights. *' I have the little bird upstairs 
 this minute, and she never sang a note yet ! " 
 
 Mrs. M'Evoy here permitted herself to sub- 
 side into fat and deep-seated chuckles, and Miss 
 M'Evoy, James, and I gave way suitably to our 
 feelings. 
 
 ''Well, now, I thought it was a nice idea, the 
 canary to be singing," said Dr. Hickey, emerging 
 from the situation as from a football scrimmage, 
 in which he had retained possession of the 
 ball "The next time I tell the story, I'll leave 
 that out, and I can say that the lady that lepped 
 like a horse was Mrs. M'Evoy. They'll believe 
 me then." 
 
 "Why wouldn't you say the canary was an 
 eagle? " said Miss M'Evoy. *' There used to be 
 plenty eagles in these mountains back here." 
 
 "Well, indeed, I might too," said Dr. Hickey. 
 " I remember it was somewhere in these parts 
 that an uncle of mine was staying one time, and 
 a man came to the hotel with an eagle to sell to 
 the tourists. My uncle was like Mrs. M'Evoy 
 here, he was very fond of birds; and the man 
 
 182 
 
When I First Met Dr. Hickey 
 
 said the eagle'd be a lovely pet. Whatever way 
 it was, he bought it." He paused to light a 
 cigarette, and James pretended to collect the 
 coffee cups. 
 
 '* He gave the eagle to the Boots to mind for 
 him," resumed the Doctor, *' and the Boots put it 
 into an empty bedroom. It wasn't more than 
 seven o'clock next morning when my uncle was 
 wakened up, and the waiter came in. * There's 
 a man in the kitchen, your honour,' says he, ' and 
 he has a great fighting aigle, and he says he'll 
 fight your honour's aigle in the passage.' They 
 had a grand fight between the two o' them in the 
 spare room, and in the end my uncle's eagle went 
 up the chimney, and the man's eagle went out 
 through the glass in the window. My uncle had 
 a nice bill to pay for all that was broken in the 
 room, and in the end he gave the eagle to the 
 
 Zoo." 
 
 "Faith, he did not!" shouted James suddenly. 
 ** He left him stuck in the chimbley ! And sure 
 it was I that got him out, and meself that sold 
 him to a gentleman that was going to Ameriky. 
 Sure, I was the waiter ! " 
 
 Dr. Hickey threw himself back in his rustic 
 
 chair. 
 
 '* Holy smoke ! This is no place for me," he 
 said ; ** every story I have is true in spite of me." 
 
 183 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 Soon afterwards the ladies went to bed, and 
 Dr. Hickey and I smoked on for a time. He 
 explained to me that he was here as "locum" 
 for a friend of his ; it wasn't much of a catch, but 
 he was only just after passing for his Medical, 
 and you'd nearly go as locum for a tinker's dog 
 after you had three years' grinding in Dublin put 
 in. This was a God-forsaken sort of a hole, not 
 a hound within fifty miles, nor anyone that would 
 know a hound if they saw one, but the fishing 
 was middling good. From this point the con- 
 versation flowed smoothly into channels of sport, 
 and the dual goals of Dr. Rickey's ambition 
 were divulged to me. 
 
 '' There was a chap I was at school with — 
 Knox his name was — that has a little pack of 
 foxhounds down in the South, and he's as good 
 as promised me I'm to whip in to him if I can 
 get the Skebawn Dispensary that's vacant now, 
 and I might have as good a chance of it as 
 another." 
 
 My own ambitions were also, at the moment, 
 dual, being matrimonial, with a Resident Magis- 
 tracy attached, but I did not feel it necessary to 
 reveal them. I mentioned that I was having a 
 day's fishing here on my way to Donegal to 
 shoot grouse, but did not add that Philippa, to 
 whom I was newly engaged, was implicated in 
 
 184 
 
When I First Met Dr. Hickey 
 
 the grouse party, still less that it was my intention 
 to meet her the next afternoon at Carrow Cross 
 Junction, an hour away, and proceed with her to 
 the home of her uncle, an hour or so further on. 
 
 ** You might have three hours, or maybe four, 
 to wait at Carrow Cross," said Dr. Hickey, as if 
 tracking my thought ; " why wouldn't you drive 
 out to the Sports at Carrow Bay? It's only four 
 miles, and there's a Regatta there to-morrow, 
 and when the tide goes out they have races on 
 the sands. I believe there's a trotting-match 
 too, and an exhibition of crochet." 
 
 It did not seem to me that I wanted to go to 
 Carrow Bay, but it was not necessary to say so. 
 
 Trucks at the station were banging into their 
 neighbours, with much comment from the engine ; 
 I thought of Tommeen and his comrades, up 
 since 3 a.m., and still waiting to get home, and 
 it suggested the privileges of those who could 
 go to bed. 
 
 It was over a whisky and soda in the heavily 
 reminiscent atmosphere of the smoking-room 
 that Dr. Hickey told me he was going to take 
 the ladies to the Sports, and mentioned that 
 there would be a train at eleven, and a spare seat 
 on the car from Carrow Cross. It required no 
 special effort to see the position that I was to 
 occupy in relation to Mrs. M'Evoy; I followed 
 
 185 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 the diplomatic method of my country ; I looked 
 sympathetic, and knew certainly that I should 
 not be there. 
 
 \ leaned out of my window that night, to look at 
 the river, with the moon on it, hustling over the 
 shallows, and thought of the porpoise, who had 
 been so unchivalrously banished by the whale. 
 I also wondered when the English post got in. 
 I was presently aware of a head projecting from 
 a window just below, and a female voice said, as 
 if in continuance of a conversation : 
 
 ''We should coax James for the cold duck to 
 take with us." 
 
 ** That's a good idea," replied the rotund voice 
 of Mrs. M'Evoy; "we'll get nothing out there 
 that a Christian could eat, and there might be 
 that gentleman too." (That gentleman closed 
 one eye.) ** Come in now. Ally ! There's an east 
 wind coming in that would perish the crows." 
 
 The guillotine slam of the sash followed. The 
 river warbled and washed through the stillness ; 
 its current was not colder, more clear, than "that 
 gentleman's" resolve that he would not grace 
 the luncheon party at Carrow Bay Sports. 
 
 I breakfasted late and in solitude, ministered 
 to by one of the female underlings of James ; the 
 voice of James himself, I heard distantly, in war 
 and slaughtering, somewhere behind the scenes. 
 
 i86 
 
When I First Met Dr. Hickey 
 
 The letter that I wanted had not failed me, and 
 I smoked a very honeyed cigarette over it in the 
 garden afterwards. A glimpse of Dr. Hickey at 
 the hotel door in a palpably new tie, and of Mrs. 
 and Miss M'Evoy in splendour in the hall, broke 
 into my peace. I quietly but unhesitatingly got 
 over the wall of the garden, and withdrew by 
 way of the river bank. 
 
 When the 1 1 o'clock train had left I returned 
 to the halcyon stillness of the hotel; my own 
 train left at 1.30; it was a time favourable, and 
 almost attractive, for letter writing. As I wrote, 
 I heard the voice of James demanding in thunder 
 where was Festus O'Flaherty, and why hadn't 
 he the chickens plucked. A small female voice 
 replied that the Doctor and the ladies had left 
 their lunch after them, and that Festus had run 
 up to the station to try would he overtake them 
 with it, and the thrain was gone. 
 
 ** And if it was themselves they left after them," 
 retorted James, still in thunder, '' what was that 
 
 to him ? " 
 
 To this conundrum no answer was attempted ; 
 I bestowed upon Mrs. M'Evoy some transient 
 compassion, and she and her company departed, 
 hull down, below the horizon of my thoughts. 
 
 A few hours afterwards, I trod the solitudes of 
 Carrow Cross Junction, and saw the train that had 
 
 187 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 brought me there bend Hke a caterpillar round 
 a spur of hill, and disappear. When I looked 
 round again the little bookstall was shuttered up, 
 and the bookstall lady was vanishing down a 
 flight of steps ; the porter had entrenched himself 
 in the goods store ; the stationmaster was with- 
 drawn from human ken with the completeness 
 only achievable by his kind. I was suspended 
 in space for three hours, and the indifference of 
 my fellow-creatures was unconcealed. A long 
 walk to nowhere and back again was the obvious 
 resource of the destitute. 
 
 The town of Carrow Cross lay in a hollow be- 
 low the station, with the blue turf smoke stagnant 
 above its muddle of slate and thatched roofs ; I 
 skirted it, and struck out into the country. I did 
 not find it attractive. Potato fields in September 
 are not looking their best ; there were no trees, 
 and loose, crooked walls overran the landscape. 
 The peak of Dreelish mountain was visible, but 
 the dingy green country rose high between me 
 and it, like the cope on the neck of a priest. I 
 walked for an hour; I sat on a wall and read 
 Philippa s letter again, and found, with a shock, 
 that I had only one cigarette left. A fatuous 
 fear of missing the train turned me back in the 
 direction of the station, slightly hungry, and pro- 
 foundly bored. I came into the town by a con- 
 
 i88 
 
When I First Met Dr. Hickey 
 
 vent, and saw the nuns walking flowingly in twos, 
 under chestnut trees ; asceticism in its most 
 pictorial aspect, with the orange leaves and the 
 blue September haze, and the black robes and 
 white headgear. I wondered how they managed 
 to go on walking neatly to nowhere and back 
 again with such purpose, and if they felt as jaded 
 as I, and as little enlivened by the environs of 
 Carrow Cross. 
 
 The town was an unprepossessing affair of two 
 or three streets, whitewash and thatch squeezed 
 between green and gold pubs, like old country- 
 women among fashionable daughters. Every- 
 thing was closed ; as I looked along the empty 
 street an outside car drawn by a dun pony turned 
 into it at high speed, the pony forging with a 
 double click-clack. As the car swune towards 
 me some one flourished a stick, some one else a 
 red parasol. 
 
 *' We got a bit tired waiting for the sports," 
 Dr. Hickey said, as he assisted Mrs. M*Evoy to 
 alight at a house labelled Lynch's Railway Hotel, 
 in royal blue; '*it seemed that the tide wasn't 
 going out as fast as the Committee expected. It 
 might be another hour or more before the race- 
 course would be above water, and we thought we 
 might as well come on here and get something to 
 eat at the Hotel." 
 
 189 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 "It has the appearance of being closed," said 
 Mrs. M'Evoy, in a voice thinned by famine. 
 
 " That might be a fashion it has in the after- 
 noon, when themselves does be at their dinner," 
 said the car-driver. 
 
 The front door was certainly closed, and there 
 was neither knocker nor bell, nothing but a large 
 well-thumbed keyhole. Dr. Hickey hammered 
 with his stick ; nothing happened. 
 
 "They're gone to the races so," said the car- 
 driver. 
 
 In the silence that followed it seemed that I 
 could hear the flagging beat of Mrs. M*Evoy's 
 heart. 
 
 " Wait awhile," said Dr. Hickey ; " the window 
 isn't bolted ! " 
 
 The sill was no more than two feet from the 
 ground, the sash yielded to pressure and went 
 up ; Dr. Hickey dived in, and we presently heard 
 him assail the front door from inside. 
 
 It was locked, and its key had apparently gone 
 to the races. I followed Dr. Hickey by way of 
 the window, so did Miss M'Evoy; we pooled 
 our forces, and drew her mamma after us through 
 the opening of two foot by three, steadily, as the 
 great god Pan drew the pith from the reed. 
 
 We found ourselves in a small sitting-room, 
 almost filled by a table ; there was a mature smell 
 
 190 
 
When I First Met Dr, Hickey 
 
 of cabbage, but there was nothing else to suggest 
 the presence of food. We proceeded to the 
 nether regions, which were like a chapter in a 
 modern realistic novel, and found a sickly kitchen 
 fire, the horrid remains of the Lynch family 
 breakfast, an empty larder, and some of the home 
 attire of the race-goers, lying, as the tree lies, 
 where it fell. 
 
 " There's a sort of a butcher in the town," said 
 Dr. Hickey, when the search-parties had con- 
 verged on each other, empty-handed, ** maybe 
 we could cook something " 
 
 " If it was even a bit of salt pork — " said Mrs. 
 M'Evoy, seizing the poker and attacking the 
 sleepy fire. 
 
 *' Let you get some water, and Til wash the 
 plates," said Miss M'Evoy to Dr. Hickey. 
 
 I looked at my watch, saw that I had still an 
 hour and a half to play with, and departed to 
 look for the butcher. 
 
 Neither by sign-board nor by shop front did 
 the Carrow Cross butcher reveal himself. I was 
 finally investigating a side street, where the 
 houses were one-storeyed, and thatched, and 
 wholly unpromising, when a heavy running step, 
 that might have been a horse's, thundered be- 
 hind me, and a cumbrous pale woman, with the 
 face of a fugitive, plunged past me, and burst 
 
 191 
 
/;; Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 in at a cottage door like a mighty blast of wind. 
 A little girl, in tears, thudded barefooted after 
 her. The big woman turned in the doorway, 
 and shrieked to me. 
 
 **Thim's madmen, from th' Asylum ! Come 
 inside from them, for God's sake ! " 
 
 I looked behind me up the street, and saw a 
 small, decorous party of men, flanked by a couple 
 of stalwart keepers in uniform. One of the men, 
 a white-faced being in seedy black, headed them, 
 playing an imaginary fiddle on his left arm, and 
 smiling secretly to himself Whether the lady 
 had invited me to her house as a protector, or 
 as a refugee, I did not know : she herself had 
 vanished, but through the still open door I saw, 
 miraculously, a fragment or two of meat, hang- 
 ing in the interior. I had apparently chanced 
 upon the home of the Carrow Cross butcher. 
 
 A greasy counter and a chopping-block put 
 the matter beyond doubt ; I beat upon an inner 
 door : a wail of terror responded, and then a 
 muffled voice : 
 
 " Come in under the bed to me, Chrissie, 
 before they'd ketch ye I " 
 
 There was nothing for it but to take from a 
 hook a grey and white fragment that looked like 
 bacon, place half-a-crown on the counter, and 
 depart swiftly. 
 
 192 
 
When I First Met Dr. Hickey 
 
 ** I gave a few of the Asylum patients leave 
 to go to the Sports," said Dr. Hickey, a little 
 later, when we were seated between the large 
 bare table and the wall of the little sitting-room, 
 with slices of fried pork weltering on our plates. 
 ** I saw the fellow waltzing down the street. 
 Ah! he's fairly harmless, and they've a couple 
 o' keepers with them anyway." 
 
 **The only pity was that you left the half- 
 crown," said Mrs. M'Evoy ; *'a shilling was too 
 much for it." 
 
 Mrs. M'Evoy was considerably flushed, and 
 had an effective black smear on her forehead, 
 but her voice had recovered its timbre. There 
 was a tin of biscuits on the table, there was a 
 war-worn brown teapot, and some bottles of 
 porter ; it was now four hours since I had 
 eaten anything; in spite of the cold and clear 
 resolve of the night before, I was feeding, 
 grossly yet enjoyably, with Dr. Hickey and his 
 friends. 
 
 •'This is a Temperance Hotel for the past 
 year," remarked Dr. Hickey, delicately knock- 
 ing off the head of a porter botde with the 
 sitting-room poker. " That's why it was up- 
 stairs I found the porter. I suppose they took 
 the corkscrew to the Sports with them." 
 
 " How did they lose the license at all .?" said 
 193 N 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 Mrs. M'Evoy ; '* I thought there wasn't a house 
 in Carrow Cross but had one." 
 
 "It was taken from them over some little 
 mistake about selling potheen," replied Dr. 
 Hickey, courteously applying the broken neck 
 of the bottle to Mrs. M'Evoy's tumbler. ''The 
 police came to search the house, and old Lynch, 
 that was in bed upstairs, heard them, and threw 
 a two-gallon jar of potheen out of the top back 
 window, to break it. The unlucky thing was 
 that there was a goose in the yard, and it was 
 on the goose it fell." 
 
 '•The creature!" said Miss M'Evoy, "was 
 she killed?" 
 
 " Killed to the bone, as they say," replied the 
 Doctor ; " but the trouble was, that on account 
 of falling on the goose the jar wasn't broken, so 
 the bobbies got the potheen." 
 
 " Supposing they summons you now for the 
 porter!" said Mrs. M'Evoy, facetiously, casting 
 her eye through the open window into the bare 
 sunshiny street. 
 
 "They'll have summonses enough at Carrow 
 Bay to keep them out of mischief," returned Dr. 
 Hickey. " It's a pity now, Major, you didn't 
 patronise the Sports. They might have put 
 you on judging the cakes with Mrs. M'Evoy." 
 
 " Why then, the one they put on with me was 
 194 
 
When I First Met Dr. Hickey 
 
 the man they had judging the vegetables," said 
 Mrs. M'Evoy, after a comfortable pull at the con- 
 traband porter. " ' That's a fine weighty cake,' 
 says me lad, weighing a sponge-cake on his hand. 
 ** We'll give that one the prize." 
 
 " I wish you brought it here with you," said 
 her daughter, " as weighty as it was." 
 
 *' They put w^ judging the row-boats," said Dr. 
 Hickey, "but after the third race I had to give 
 up, and put five stitches in one of the men that 
 was in the mark- boat." 
 
 I said that the mark-boat ought to have been 
 a fairly safe place. 
 
 '* Safe ! " said Dr. Hickey. ** It was the hottest 
 corner in the course. I thought they were sunk 
 twice, but they might have been all right if they 
 hadn't out-oars and joined in the race on the 
 second round. They got in first, as it happened, 
 and it was in the course of the protest that I had 
 to put in the stitches. It was a good day's sport, 
 as far as it went." 
 
 " Ah, there's no life in a Regatta without a 
 band," said Miss M'Evoy languidly, with her 
 elbows on the table and her cup in her hand. 
 " Now Ringsend Regatta's sweet ! " 
 
 ** I'm afraid Miss M'Evoy didn't enjoy herself 
 to-day," said Dr. Hickey. " Of course she's used 
 
 to so much attention in Dublin " 
 
 195 
 
In Mr. Kno$^s Country 
 
 ** It's kind of you to say that," said Miss 
 M*Evoy ; ''I'm sure you're quite an authority on 
 Dublin young ladies." 
 
 " Is it me?" said Dr. Hickey; '' I'd be afraid 
 to say Boo to a goose. But I've a brother that 
 could tell you all about them. He's not as shy as 
 I am." 
 
 " He must be a great help and comfort to you," 
 returned Miss M'Evoy. 
 
 **He's very romantic," said Dr. Hickey, "and 
 poetical. He was greatly struck with two young 
 ladies he met at the Ringsend Regatta last 
 month. He mistook their address, someway, and 
 when he couldn't find them, what did he do but 
 put a poem in the papers — the Agony Column, 
 y'know " 
 
 ''We'd like to hear that," said Mrs. M'Evoy, 
 putting her knife into the salt with unhurried 
 dexterity. 
 
 " I forget it all, only the last verse," said Dr. 
 Hickey, ** it went this way : 
 
 * You are indeed a charming creature. 
 Perfect alike in form and feature, 
 I love you and none other. 
 Oh, Letitia — Here's your Mother ! ' " 
 
 As Dr. Hickey, his eyes modestly on his plate, 
 concluded the ode, I certainly intercepted a peculiar 
 glance between the ladies. 
 
 196 
 
When I First Met Dr. Hickey 
 
 " I call that very impident," said Mrs. M*Evoy, 
 winking at me. 
 
 ** It was worth paying a good deal to put that 
 in print!" commented Miss M'Evoy unkindly. 
 " But that was a lovely Regatta," she continued, 
 ** and the music and the fireworks were grand, 
 but the society's very mixed. Do you remember, 
 M'ma, what happened to Mary and me that 
 evening, the time we missed you in the dark ? " 
 
 ** Indeed'n I do," said Mrs. M'Evoy, her eyes 
 still communing with her daughter's, " and I 
 remember telling you it was the last evening I'd 
 let you out of my sight." 
 
 ** It was a gentleman that picked up my 
 umbrella," began Miss M'Evoy artlessly. 
 
 Dr. Hickey dropped his knife on the floor, 
 and took some time to pick it up. 
 
 '* And he passed the remark to me that it was 
 a nice evening," went on Miss M'Evoy. *' ' It is,' 
 said I. Now, M'ma, why wouldn't I give him a 
 civil answer? " 
 
 ** That's according to taste," said Mrs. M'Evoy. 
 
 "Well indeed I didn't fancy his looks at all. 
 It was pitch dark only for the fireworks, but I 
 thought he had a nasty kind of a foreign look, 
 and a little pointed beard on him too. If you saw 
 the roll of his eye when the green fire fell out of 
 
 the rockets you'd think of Mephistopheles " 
 
 197 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 " There's no doubt Mephistopheles was one of 
 Shakespeare's grandest creations," said Dr. Hickey 
 hurriedly. His eyes besought my aid. It struck 
 me that this literary digression was an attempt to 
 change the conversation. 
 
 Miss M'Evoy resumed her narrative. 
 
 " * That's a pretty flower you have in your 
 button-hole,' said he. * It is,' said I." 
 
 " You didn't tell him a great deal he didn't 
 know," said her mother. 
 
 ** ' Maybe you might give it to me ? ' said he. 
 'Maybe I might not!' said I. * And where do 
 you live?' said he. 'Percy Place,' says Mary, 
 before you could wink. Anyone would have to 
 believe her. ' Upon my soul,' said he, * I'll have 
 the pleasure of calling upon you. Might I ask 
 what your name is?' * O'Rooney,' says Mary, 
 'and this is my cousin. Miss Letitia Gollagher.' 
 Well, when Mary said * Gollagher,' I burst/'' 
 
 Miss M'Evoy here put down her cup, and to 
 some slight extent repeated the operation. 
 
 " I suppose the foreign gentleman told you 
 his own name then?" said Dr. Hickey, whose 
 complexion had warmed up remarkably. 
 
 *' He did not," said Miss M'Evoy ; " but perhaps 
 that was because he wasn't asked, and it was 
 then M'ma came up. I can tell you he didn't 
 wait to be introduced ! " 
 
 198 
 
When I First Met Dr. Hickey 
 
 ** I have a sister-in-law living in Percy Place," 
 said Mrs. M'Evoy, passing her handkerchief over 
 her brow, and addressing no one in particular, 
 " and it was some day last month she was telling 
 me of a young man that was knocking at all the 
 doors down the street, and she thought he was 
 a Collector of some sort. He came to her house 
 too, and he told the girl he was looking for some 
 ladies of the name of Gollagher or O'Rooney." 
 
 She paused, and regarded Dr. Hickey. 
 
 " I wonder did he find them ? " asked Dr. Hickey, 
 who was obviously being forced on to the ropes. 
 
 " I thought j)/d?^^ might be able to tell us that!" 
 said Mrs. M'Evoy, delivering her knock-out 
 blow with the suddenness that belongs to the 
 highest walks of the art. 
 
 Miss M'Evoy, with equal suddenness, uttered 
 a long and strident yell, and lay back in her 
 place, grasping my arm as she did so, in what I 
 am convinced was wholly unconscious sympathy. 
 She and I were side by side, facing the window, 
 and through the window, which, as I have men- 
 tioned, was wide open, I was aware of a new 
 element in the situation. 
 
 It was a figure in blue in the street outside ; a 
 soft and familiar blue, and it bore a parasol of the 
 same colour. The figure was at a standstill ; and 
 very blue, the burning blue of tropical heavens, 
 
 199 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 were the eyes that met mine beneath the canopy 
 of the parasol. Even before my own had time 
 to blink I foreknew that never, in time or in 
 eternity, should I be able to make Philippa accept 
 thoroughly my explanation. 
 
 Philippa's explanation was extremely brief, and 
 was addressed rather to the empty street of 
 Carrow Cross than to me, as I crawled by her 
 side. There had been, she said, half an hour to 
 wait, and as I was not at the station — the blue 
 eyes met mine for a steely moment — she had 
 gone for a little walk. She had met some horrid 
 drunken men, and turned into another street to 
 avoid them, and then 
 
 A brimming silence followed. We turned up 
 the road that led to the station. 
 
 "There are those men again!" exclaimed 
 Philippa, coming a little nearer to me. 
 
 In front of us, deviously ascending the long 
 slope, was the Asylum party ; the keepers, exceed- 
 ingly drunk, being assisted to the station by the 
 Lunatics. 
 
 200 
 
VIII 
 
 THE BOSOM OF THE McRORYS 
 
 Since the day when fate had shipwrecked us at 
 the end of the Temple Braney shrubbery, and 
 flung us, dripping, into the bosoms of the 
 McRorys, we had been the victims of an indis- 
 soluble friendship with the family. This fulfilled 
 itself in many ways. 
 
 Gratitude, what is known as Common Gratitude 
 (which is merely a hollow compliance with the 
 voice of conscience), impelled us to lunch Mr. 
 and Mrs. McRory, heavily and elaborately (but 
 without any one to meet them) ; to invite the 
 whole family to a lawn-tennis party (and the 
 whole family came) ; and, at other people's tennis 
 parties, to fawn upon them (when it was no 
 longer possible to elude them). It was a despic- 
 able position, and had I at all foreseen, when the 
 picnic sank at Temple Braney pier, that the 
 result would have been dinner-parties, I should 
 unhesitatingly have left Philippa to drown. 
 
 The intimacies imposed by Common Gratitude 
 had, under the healing hand of time, become less 
 acute, and might, indeed, have ceased to affect 
 
 201 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 us, had not fate again intervened, and cemented 
 the family friendship in the most public way- 
 possible. There befell a Harvest Festival in 
 Skebawn Church, with a Bishop, and an Anthem, 
 and a special collection. To it the McRorys, for- 
 saking their own place of worship, came in 
 power, and my wife, very superfluously, indi- 
 cated to Mrs. McRory a seat in our pew. The 
 pew is a front one, and Mrs. McRory became at 
 once a figure-head to the rest of the congregation 
 — a buxom figure-head, upholstered tightly in 
 royal blue satin, that paled the ineffectual fires 
 of the pulpit dahlias, and shouted in a terrible 
 major chord with the sunflowers in the east 
 window. She creaked mysteriously and rhyth- 
 mically with every breath ; a large gold butterfly, 
 poised on an invisible spring, quivered and 
 glittered above her bonnet. It was while waiting 
 for the service to begin that Philippa was inspired 
 to whisper to Mrs McRory some information, 
 quite immaterial, connected with the hymns. 
 The next moment I perceived that Mrs. McRory's 
 butterfly had fixed its antennae into some adjunct 
 of my wife's hat that was at once diaphanous 
 and sinewy, with the result that the heads of 
 the two ladies were locked together. A silent 
 struggle ensued ; the butterfly's grappling-irons 
 held, so also did the hat-trimming, and Philippa 
 
 202 
 
T^he "Bosom of the Mc'^rys 
 
 and Mrs. McRory remained brow to brow in 
 what seemed to be a prolonged embrace. At 
 this point Philippa showed signs of collapse ; she 
 said that Mrs. McRory's nose, glowing like a 
 ruby within two inches of her own, made her 
 hysterical. I affected unconsciousness, while my 
 soul thirsted for an axe with which to decapitate 
 one or both of the combatants, and subsequently 
 to run amok among the congregation, now, as 
 the poet says, "abashlessly abandoned to delight." 
 The butterfly's vitals slowly uncoiled, and were 
 drawn out into a single yet indomitable strand of 
 gold wire ; the Bishop was imminent, when a 
 female McRory in the pew behind (known to the 
 Fancy as " Larkie ") intervened with what were, 
 I believe, a pair of manicure scissors, and the 
 incident closed. 
 
 It was clear that our blood-brotherhood with 
 the McRorys was foreordained and predestined. 
 We evaded two invitations to dinner, but a third 
 was inescapable, even though an alarming inti- 
 macy was foreshadowed by the request that we 
 should come " in a very quiet way." 
 
 ** Do they expect us to creep in in tennis 
 shoes?" I demanded. 
 
 '* I think it only means a black tie," said 
 Philippa, with the idea that she was sooth- 
 ing me. 
 
 203 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 " If I have to go to a McRory Free-and-Easy, 
 I shall not act as such," I returned, slamming 
 myself into my dressing-room, and dragging 
 forth ceremonial attire. 
 
 As, with a docility that I was far from feeling, 
 I followed my wife into the drawing-room at 
 Temple Braney, and surveyed the semicircle of 
 McRorys and unknown notabilities (summarised 
 as '* Friends from Dublin ") that silently awaited 
 us, I felt that neither freedom nor ease would be 
 my lot. But few things in life are quite as bad 
 as one expects them to be — always excepting 
 sea-sickness. In its dreary circuit of the room, 
 my eye met that of my old friend Miss Bobby 
 Bennett, of the Curranhilty Hunt, niece of its 
 Master, and consultant and referee in all its 
 affairs. My friendship with Miss Bennett was 
 of an ideal nature ; when we met, which was 
 seldom, we were delighted to see one another ; 
 in the intervals we forgot one another with, I 
 felt sure, an equal completeness. Her social 
 orbit was incalculable ; she resembled a fox of 
 whom I heard an earth-stopper say that you 
 "couldn't tell any certain place where he wouldn't 
 puck out." Whether it was at Punchestown, or 
 at a Skebawn Parish tea, or judging cakes and 
 crochet at an Agricultural Show, wherever she 
 appeared it was with the same air of being on 
 
 204 
 
The ^osom of the McT{orys 
 
 top of the situation and of extracting the utmost 
 from it. 
 
 To me befell the onerous task of taking the 
 Lady of the House in to dinner, but upon my 
 other hand sat Miss Bennett (squired by a Friend 
 from Dublin of apparently negligible quality), 
 and before I had recovered from the soup — a 
 hell-broth of liquid mustard that called itself 
 mulligatawny — I found that to concentrate upon 
 her was no more than was expected of me by 
 both ladies. Mrs. McRory's energies were in- 
 deed fully engrossed by the marshalling of a 
 drove of heated females, who hurried stertorously 
 and spasmodically round i the table, driven as 
 leaves before the wind by fierce signals from 
 their trainer. Opposite to me sat that daughter 
 of the house whose manicure scissors had termi- 
 nated the painful episode of the butterfly. I had 
 always maintained that she was the prettiest 
 of the McRorys, and it was evident that Irving, 
 the new District Inspector of R.I.C., who sat 
 beside her, shared my opinion. He was a serious, 
 lanky young man, and at such moments as he 
 found himself deprived of Miss McRory's ex- 
 clusive attention, he accepted no alternative, and 
 devoted himself austerely to his food. 
 
 Miss Bennett's intention was, I presently dis- 
 covered, to hunt with Flurry Knox's hounds on 
 
 205 
 
In Mr, Knox 5 Country 
 
 the following day : she had brought over a horse, 
 and it became clear to me that her secondary 
 intention was to return without it. 
 
 ** Larkie McRory's going to take up hunting," 
 she said in her low swift voice. " The new D.I. 
 hunts, you know." 
 
 Miss Bennett's astute grey eyes rested upon 
 the young lady in question, and returned to me 
 laden with inference. 
 
 ** He's got a horse from a farmer for her to 
 ride to-morrow — goodness knows what sort of a 
 brute it is ! — I hope she won't break her neck. 
 She's the best of the lot. If the old man had 
 sense he'd buy my mare for her — he's full of 
 money — and I'd let her go cheap, too, as I have 
 a young one coming on." 
 
 It is worthy of mention that I have never 
 known Miss Bennett's stable composed of any- 
 thing save old ones to go cheap and young ones 
 coming on. I asked her what she would give 
 me if I didn't tell Mr. McRory that her mare 
 was touched in the wind. 
 
 " I'll give you in charge for defamation of 
 character," replied Miss Bennett, with speed 
 comparable only to the dart of an ant-eater's 
 tongue. ''Anything else you'd like to know? 
 But look at Larkie now, I ask of you ! Quick ! '* 
 
 I did as desired, and was fortunate enough 
 206 
 
ne ^osom of the Mc'^rys 
 
 to see Miss McRory in the act of putting a 
 spoonful of salt in Mr. Irving's champagne, what 
 time he was engaged in repulsing one of Mrs. 
 McRory 's band of flaming ministers, who, with 
 head averted in consultation with a collaborator, 
 was continuously offering him melted butter, re- 
 gardless of the fact that he had, at the moment, 
 nothing in front of him but the tablecloth. 
 
 ** There's Miss Larkie's Dublin manners for 
 you," said Miss Bennett, and passed on to other 
 themes. 
 
 I should say theme, because, speaking broadly, 
 Miss Bennett had but one, and all roads sooner 
 or later led to it. During the slow progress of 
 the meal I was brought up to date in the inner 
 gossip of the Curranhilty country. I learned 
 that Mrs. Albert Dougherty had taken to riding 
 astride because she thought it was smart, and it 
 was nothing but the grab she got of the noseband 
 that saved her from coming off every time she 
 came down a drop. I asked for that Mr. Tomsy 
 Flood whose career had twice, at vital points, been 
 intersected by me. 
 
 ** Ah, poor Tomsy ! He took to this, y'know," 
 Miss Bennett slighdy jerked her little finger, 
 " and he wouldn't ride a donkey over a sod of 
 turf They sent him out to South Africa, to an 
 ostrich farm, and when the people found he 
 
 207 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 couldn't ride they put him to bed with a setting 
 of ostrich eggs to keep them warm, and he did 
 that grand, till some one gave him a bottle of 
 whisky, and he got rather lively and broke all 
 the eggs. They say it's a lay-preacher he's 
 going to be now ! " 
 
 Across a dish of potatoes, thrust at me for the 
 fourth time, I told Miss Bennett that it was all 
 her fault, and that she had been very unkind to 
 Tomsy Flood. Miss Bennett gave me a look 
 that showed me what she still could do if she 
 liked, and replied that she supposed I was 
 sorry that she hadn't gone to South Africa 
 with him. 
 
 " I suppose we'll all be going there soon," she 
 went on. *' Uncle says if Home Rule comes there 
 won't be a fox or a Protestant left in Ireland in 
 ten years' time ; and he said, what's more, that if 
 he had to choose it mightn't be the Protestants 
 he'd keep! But that was because the Dissent- 
 ing Minister's wife sent in a claim of five pounds 
 to the Fowl Fund, and said she'd put down poison 
 if she didn't get it." 
 
 Not thus did Philippa and old McRory, at 
 their end of the table, fleet the time away. Old 
 McRory, as far as I could judge, spoke not at all, 
 but played tunes with his fingers on the table- 
 cloth, or preoccupied himself with what seemed 
 
 208 
 
'The ^osom of the Mc^rys 
 
 to be an endeavour to plait his beard into a point. 
 On my wife's other hand was an unknown gentle- 
 man, with rosy cheeks, a raven moustache, and 
 a bald head, who was kind enough to solace her 
 isolation with facetious stories, garnished with free 
 and varied gestures with his knife, suggestive of 
 sword-practice, all concluding alike in convulsive 
 tenor laughter. I was aware, not unpleasantly, 
 that Philippa was bearing the brunt of the 
 McRory bean-feast. 
 
 When at length my wife's release was earned, 
 and the ladies had rustled from the room in her 
 wake, with all the conscious majesty of the Mantle 
 Department, I attempted some conversation with 
 my host, but found that it was more considerate 
 to leave him to devour unmolested the crystallised 
 fruits and chocolates that were not, I felt quite 
 sure, provided by Mrs. McRory for the Master 
 of the House. I retired upon the D.I., my 
 opinion of whom had risen since I saw him 
 swallow his salted champagne without a change 
 of countenance. That he addressed me as " Sir " 
 was painful, but at about my age these shocks 
 have to be expected, and are in the same cate- 
 gory as lumbago, and what my dentist delicately 
 alludes to as ** dentures." 
 
 The young District Inspector of Irish Con- 
 stabulary has wisdom beyond his years : we 
 
 209 o 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 talked profoundly of the state of the country until 
 the small voice of old McRory interrupted us. 
 
 "Major," it said, "if you have enough drink 
 taken we might join the ladies." 
 
 Most of the other gallants had already preceded 
 us, and as I crossed the hall I heard the measured 
 pounding of a waltz on the piano : it created an 
 impulse, almost as uncontrollable as that of 
 Spurius Lartius and Herminius, to dart back to 
 the dining-room. 
 
 " That's the way with them every night," said 
 old McRory dispassionately. " They mightn't go 
 to bed now at all." 
 
 Old McRory had a shadowy and imperceptible 
 quality that is not unusual in small fathers of 
 large families ; it always struck me that he under- 
 stood very thoroughly the privileges of the 
 neglected, and pursued an unnoticed, peaceful, 
 and observant path of his own in the background. 
 I watched him creep away in his furtive, stupefied 
 manner, like a partly-chloroformed ferret. " ' Oh, 
 well is thee, thou art asleep ! ' — or soon will be," 
 I said to myself, as I turned my back on him and 
 faced the music. 
 
 I was immediately gratified by the spectacle of 
 Philippa, clasped to the heart of the gentleman 
 who had been kind to her at dinner, and moving 
 with him in slow and crab-like sidlings round the 
 
 210 
 
The "Bosom of the Mc^rys 
 
 carpet. Her eyes met mine with passionate 
 appeal ; they reminded me of those of her own 
 fox-terrier, Minx, when compelled to waltz with 
 my younger son. 
 
 The furniture and the elder ladies had been 
 piled up in corners, and the dancing element had 
 been reinforced by a gang of lesser McRorys and 
 their congeners, beings who had not been deemed 
 worthy of a place at the high table. Immured 
 behind the upright piano sat Mrs. McRory, 
 thumping out the time-honoured " Blue Danube" 
 with the plodding rhythm of the omnibus horse. 
 I furtively looked at my watch ; we had dined at 
 7.30, and it was now but a quarter to ten o'clock. 
 Not for half an hour could we in decency with- 
 draw, and, finding myself at the moment beside 
 Miss Larkie McRory, it seemed to me that I 
 could do no less than invite her to take the carpet 
 with me. 
 
 I am aware that my dancing is that of ten 
 years ago, which places it in the same scrap-heap 
 class as a battleship of that date, but Miss 
 McRory told me that she preferred it, and that 
 it exacdy suited her step. It would be as easy 
 to describe the way of a bird in the air as to define 
 Miss McRory 's step ; scrap-heap or no, it made 
 me feel that I walked the carpet like a thing of 
 life. We were occasionally wrecked upon reefs 
 
 211 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 of huddled furniture, and we sustained a collision 
 or two of first-rate magnitude : after these episodes 
 my partner imperceptibly steered me to a corner, 
 in which I leaned heavily against whatever was 
 most stable, and tried to ignore the fact that the 
 floor was rocking and the walls were waving, 
 and that it was at least two years since I had 
 exceeded in this way. 
 
 It was in one of these intervals that Miss 
 McRory told me that she was going hunting next 
 day, and that he — her long hazel-grey eyes indi- 
 cated Mr. Irving, now slowly and showily moving 
 a partner about the room — had got a horse for 
 her to ride, and she had never hunted before. 
 She hoped to goodness she wouldn't fall off, and 
 (here she dealt me the fraction of a glance) she 
 hoped I'd pick her up now and again. I said 
 that the two wishes were incompatible, to which 
 she replied that she didn't know what incompatible 
 meant ; and I told her to ask Mr. Irving whether 
 he had found that salt and champagne were 
 compatible. 
 
 *• I thought you only wore that old eyeglass 
 for show," replied Miss McRory softly, and again 
 looked up at me from under her upcurled Irish 
 eyelashes ; " it was out of spite he drank it ! A 
 girl did that to my brother Curly at a dance, and 
 he poured it down her back." 
 
 212 
 
The Bosom of the Mc^rys 
 
 " I think Mr. Irving treated you better than 
 you deserved," I replied paternally, adventuring 
 once more into the tide of dancers. 
 
 When, some five minutes afterwards, I resigned 
 my partner to Irving D.I., I felt that honour had 
 been satisfied, and that it was now possible to 
 leave the revel. But in this I found that I had 
 reckoned, not so much without my host, as without 
 my fellow-guest. Philippa, to my just indignation, 
 had blossomed into the success of the evening. 
 Having disposed of the kind-hearted gentleman 
 (with the pink cheeks and the black moustache), 
 she was immediately claimed by Mr. De Lacey 
 McRory, the eldest son of the house, and with 
 him exhibited a proficiency in the latest variant 
 of the waltz that she had hitherto concealed 
 from me. The music, like the unseen orchestra 
 of a merry-go-round, was practically continuous. 
 Scuffles took place at intervals behind the upright 
 piano, during which music-books fell heavily upon 
 the keys, and one gathered that a change of 
 artist was taking place, but the fundamental bang- 
 ing of the bass was maintained, and the dancing 
 ceased not. The efforts of the musicians were 
 presently reinforced by a young lady in blue, who 
 supplied a shrill and gibbering obligate upon a 
 beribboned mandoline, and even, at some pas- 
 sionate moments, added her voice to the ensemble, 
 
 213 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 " Will this go on much longer ? " I asked of 
 Miss Bennett, with whom I had withdrawn to 
 the asylum of a bow window. 
 
 '' D'ye mean Miss Cooney O'Rattigan and 
 her mandoline ? " replied Miss Bennett. " I can 
 tell you it was twice worse this afternoon when 
 she was singing Italian to it. I never stayed 
 here before, and please goodness I never will 
 again; the wardrobe in my room is crammed 
 with Mrs. McRory's summer clothes, and the 
 chest of drawers is full of apples ! Ah, but after 
 all," went on Miss Bennett largely, ** what can 
 you expect from a cob but a kick? Didn't 
 Tomsy Flood find a collection of empty soda- 
 water bottles in his bed the time he stayed 
 here for the wedding, when you found him 
 stitched up in the feather bed ! " 
 
 I said that the soda-water bottles had probably 
 prepared him for the ostrich eggs, and Miss 
 Bennett asked me if it were true that I had once 
 found a nest of young mice in the foot of my bed 
 at Aussolas, because that was the story she had 
 heard. I was able to assure her that, on the 
 contrary, it had been kittens, and passing from 
 these pleasing reminiscences I asked her to come 
 forth and smoke a cigarette in the hall with me, 
 as a preliminary to a farther advance in the direc- 
 tion of the motor. I have a sincere regard for 
 
 214 
 
Miss Cooney O'Rattigan. 
 
T!he "Bosom of the Mc^rys 
 
 Miss Bennett, but her dancing is a serious matter, 
 with a Cromwellian quality in it, suggestive of 
 jack boots and the march of great events. 
 
 The cigarettes were consolatory, and the two 
 basket-chairs by the fire in the back-hall were 
 sufficiently comfortable ; but the prospect of home 
 burned like a beacon before me. The clock 
 struck eleven. 
 
 "They're only beginning now!" said Miss 
 Bennett, interpreting without resentment my 
 glance at it. " Last night it was near one 
 o'clock in the morning when they had high tea, 
 and then they took to singing songs, and play- 
 ing * Are you there, Mike ? ' and cock-fighting." 
 
 I rose hastily, and began to search for my 
 overcoat and cap, prepared to plunge into the 
 frosty night, when Miss Bennett offered to show 
 me a short way through the house to the stable- 
 yard, where I had left the car. 
 
 '* I slipped out that way after dinner," she 
 said, picking up a fur-lined cloak and wrapping 
 it about her. ** I wanted to make sure the mare 
 had a second rug on her this cold night." 
 
 I followed Miss Bennett through a wheezy 
 swing-door ; a flagged passage stretched like a 
 tunnel before us, lighted by a solitary candle 
 planted in its own grease in a window. A long 
 battle-line of bicycles occupied one side of the 
 
 215 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 passage ; there were doors, padlocked and cob- 
 webbed, on the other. A ragged baize door at 
 the end of the tunnel opened into darkness that 
 smelt of rat- holes, and was patched by a square 
 or two of moonlight. 
 
 "This is a sort of a lobby," said Miss Bennett. 
 *' Mind ! There's a mangle there — and there 
 are oars on the floor somewhere " 
 
 As she spoke I was aware of a distant hum- 
 ming noise, like bees in a chimney. 
 
 "That sounds uncommonly like a motor,'* 
 I said. 
 
 *' That's only the boiler," replied Miss Bennett ; 
 " we're at the back of the kitchen here.'* 
 
 She advanced with confidence, and flung open 
 a door. A most startling vista was revealed, of 
 a lighted room with several beds in it. Children*s 
 faces, swelled and scarlet, loomed at us from the 
 pillows, and an old woman, with bare feet and 
 a shawl over her head, stood transfixed, with a 
 kettle in one hand and a tumbler in the other. 
 
 Miss Bennett swiftly closed the door upon the 
 vision. 
 
 "My gracious heavens ! " she whispered, **what 
 on earth children are those? I'm sure it's 
 mumps they have, whoever they are. And how 
 secret the McRorys kept it ! — and did you see it 
 was punch the old woman was giving them 1 " 
 
 216 
 
T^he "Bosom of the Mc^rys 
 
 ** We might have asked her the way to the 
 yard," I said, inwardly resolving to tell Phllippa 
 it was scarlatina; **and she might have given 
 us a liofht." 
 
 "It was this door I should have tried," said 
 my guide, opening another with considerable 
 circumspection. 
 
 Sounds of hilarity immediately travelled to us 
 along a passage ; I followed Miss Bennett, feel- 
 ing much as if I were being led by a detective 
 into Chinatown, San Francisco. A square of 
 light in the wall indicated one of those inner 
 windows that are supposed to give light mutu- 
 ally to room and passage, and are, as a matter 
 of fact, an architect's confession of defeat. 
 Farther on a door was open, and screams of 
 laughter and singing proceeded from it. I admit, 
 without hesitation, that we looked in at the 
 window, and thus obtained a full and sufficient 
 view of the vie intime of the Temple Braney 
 kitchen. A fat female, obviously the cook, was 
 seated in the midst of a remarkably lively crowd 
 of fellow-retainers and camp-followers, thumping 
 with massive knuckles on a frying-pan, as though 
 it were a banjo, and squalling to it something 
 in an unknown toneue. 
 
 ** She's taking off Miss Cooney O'Rattlgan ! " 
 hissed Miss Bennett, in ecstasy. " She's sing- 
 
 217 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 ing Italian, by way of! And look at those two 
 brats of boys, Vincent and Harold, that should 
 have been in their beds two hours ago ! " 
 
 Masters Vincent and Harold McRory were 
 having the time of their lives. One of them, 
 seated on the table, was shovelling tipsy-cake 
 into his ample mouth with a kitchen spoon ; the 
 other was smoking a cigarette, and capering to 
 the squalls of the cook. 
 
 As noiselessly as two bats Miss Bennett and 
 I flitted past the open door, but a silence fell 
 with a unanimity that would have done credit 
 to any orchestra. 
 
 "They saw us," said Miss Bennett, scudding 
 on, " but we'll not tell on them — the creatures ! " 
 
 An icy draught apprised us of an open door, 
 and through it we escaped at length from the 
 nightmare purlieus of the house into the yard, 
 an immense quadrangle, where moonlight and 
 black shadows opposed one another in a silence 
 that was as severe as they. Temple Braney 
 House and its yard dated from what may be 
 called the Stone Age in Ireland, about the 
 middle of the eighteenth century, when money 
 was plenty and labour cheap, and the Barons 
 of Temple Braney, now existent only in guide- 
 books, built, as they lived, on the generous 
 scale, 
 
 218 
 
7he "Bosom of the Mc^rys 
 
 We crossed the yard to the coach-house in 
 which I had left my motor : its tall arched door- 
 way was like the mouth of a cave, and I struck 
 a match. It illuminated a mowing-machine, a 
 motor-bicycle, and a flying cat. But not my car. 
 The first moment of bewilderment was closed by 
 the burning of my fingers by the match. 
 
 ** Are you sure it was here you left it ? " said 
 Miss Bennett, with a fatuity of which I had not 
 believed her capable. 
 
 The presence of a lady was no doubt a salutary 
 restraint, but as I went forth into the yard again, 
 I felt as though the things I had to leave unsaid 
 would break out all over me like prickly heat. 
 
 '* It's the medical student one," said Miss 
 Bennett with certainty, "the one that owns the 
 motor-bike." 
 
 The yard and the moonlight did not receive 
 this statement with a more profound silence 
 than I. 
 
 " I'm sure he won't do it any harm," she went 
 on, making the elementary mistake of applying 
 superficial salves to a wound whose depths she 
 was incapable of estimating. " He's very good 
 about machinery — maybe it's only round to the 
 front door he took it." 
 
 As Miss Bennett offered these consolations I 
 saw two small figures creep from the shadows of 
 
 219 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 the house. Their white collars shone in the 
 moonlight, and, recognising them as the youngest 
 members of the inveterate clan of McRory, I 
 hailed them in a roar that revealed very effectively 
 the extent of my indignation. It did not surprise 
 me that the pair, in response to this, darted out 
 of the yard gate with the speed of a pair of 
 minnows in a stream. 
 
 I pursued, not with any hope of overtaking 
 them, but because they were the only clue 
 available, and in my wake, over the frosty ground, 
 in her satin shoes, followed that sound sports- 
 woman, Miss Bennett. 
 
 The route from the stable-yard to the front of 
 Temple Braney House is a long and circuitous 
 one, that skirts a plantation of evergreens. At the 
 first bend the moonlight displayed the track of a 
 tyre in the grass ; at the next bend, where the 
 edge was higher, a similar economy of curve had 
 been effected, and that the incident had been of a 
 fairly momentous nature was suggested by the 
 circumstance that the tail lamp was lying in the 
 middle of the drive. It was as I picked it up 
 that I heard a familiar humming in the vicinity 
 of the hall door. 
 
 ** He didn't go so far, after all," said Miss 
 Bennett, somewhat blown, but holding her own, 
 in spite of the satin shoes. 
 
 220 
 
The "Bosom of the Memory s 
 
 I turned the last corner at a high rate of speed, 
 and saw the dignified Georgian facade of the 
 house, pale and placid in the moonlight ; through 
 the open hall door a shaft of yellow light fell on 
 the ground. The car was nowhere to be seen, 
 yet somewhere, close at hand, the engine throbbed 
 and drummed to me, — a cri de coeu7% as I felt it, 
 calling to me through the accursed jingle of the 
 piano that proceeded from the open door. 
 
 *« Where the devil ? " I began. 
 
 Even as I spoke I descried the car. It was 
 engaged, apparently, in forcing its way into the 
 shrubbery that screened one end of the house. 
 The bonnet was buried in a holly bush, the 
 engine was working, slowly but industriously. 
 The lamps were not lighted, and there was no 
 
 one in it. 
 
 '' Those two imps made good use of their legs, 
 never fear them!" puffed Miss Bennett; *'the 
 'cuteness of them — cutting away to warn the 
 brother ! " 
 
 '* What's this confounded thing ?" I said fiercely, 
 snatching at something that was caught in the 
 handle of the brake. 
 
 Miss Bennett snatched it in her turn, and held 
 it up in the moonlight, while I stilled the fever of 
 the engine. 
 
 " Dublin for ever ! " she exclaimed. *' What is 
 
 221 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 It but the streamers of Miss Cooney's mandoline ! 
 There's the spoils of war for you ! And it's all 
 the spoils you'll get — the whole pack of them's 
 hid in the house by now ! " 
 
 From an unlighted window over the hall door 
 a voice added itself to the conversation. 
 
 " God help the house that holds them ! " it said, 
 addressing the universe. 
 
 The window was closed. 
 
 " That's old McRory ! " said Miss Bennett in a 
 horrified whisper. 
 
 Again I thought of Chinatown, sleepless, incal- 
 culable, with its infinite capacity for sheltering 
 the criminal. 
 
 " — But, darling," said Philippa, some quarter 
 of an hour later, as we proceeded down the avenue 
 in the vaulted darkness of the beech-trees (and I 
 at once realised that she had undertaken the case 
 for the defence), *' you've no reason to suppose 
 that they took the car any farther than the hall 
 door." 
 
 *' It is the last time that it will be taken to that 
 hall door," I replied, going dead slow, with my 
 head over the side of the car, listening to un- 
 familiar sounds in its interior — sounds that did 
 not suggest health. " I should like to know how 
 many of your young friends went on the trip " 
 
 222 
 
T^he ^osom of the Mc'^rys 
 
 ** My dear boy," said Philippa pityingly, " I 
 ask you if it is likely that there would have been 
 more than two, when one of them was the lady 
 with the mandoline! And," she proceeded with 
 cat-like sweetness, ** I did not perceive that you 
 took a party with you when you retired to the 
 hall with your old friend Miss Bennett, and left 
 me to cope single-handed with the mob for about 
 an hour ! " 
 
 " Whether there were two or twenty-two of 
 them in the car," I said, treating this red herring 
 with suitable contempt, ** I've done with your 
 McRorys." 
 
 I was, very appropriately, in the act of passing 
 through the Temple Braney entrance gates as I 
 made this pronouncement, and it was the climax 
 of many outrages that the steering-gear, shaken 
 by heaven knows what impacts and brutalities, 
 should suddenly have played me false. The car 
 swerved in her course — fortunately a slow one — 
 and laid her bonnet impulsively against the 
 Temple Braney gate pillar, as against a loved 
 one's shoulder. 
 
 As we regained our composure, two tall forms 
 appeared in the light of the head lamps, and one 
 of them held up his hand. I recognised a police 
 patrol. 
 
 " That's the car right enough," said one of 
 223 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 them. He advanced to my side. ** I want your 
 name, please. I summons you for furious driving 
 on the high road, without lights, a while ago, and 
 refusing to stop when called on to do so. Go 
 round and take the number, M'Caffery." 
 
 When, a few days later, the story flowed over 
 and ran about the country, some things that were 
 both new and interesting came to my ears. 
 
 Flurry Knox said that Bobby Bennett had sold 
 me her old mare by moonlight in the Temple 
 Braney yard, and it was a great credit to old 
 McRory's champagne. 
 
 Mrs. Knox, of Aussolas, was told that I had 
 taken Mrs. McRory for a run in the car at one 
 o'clock in the morning, and on hearing it said 
 '* De gustibus non est disputandum." 
 
 Some one, unknown, repeated this to Mrs. 
 McRory, and told her that it meant *' You cannot 
 touch pitch without being disgusted." 
 
 Mrs. Cadogan, my cook, reported to Philippa 
 that the boy who drove the bread-cart said that 
 it was what the people on the roads were saying 
 that the Major was to be fined ten pounds ; to 
 which Mrs. Cadogan had replied that it was a 
 pity the Major ever stood in Temple Braney, but 
 she supposed that was laid out for him by the 
 Lord. 
 
 224 
 
IX 
 
 PUT DOWN ONE AND CARRY TWO 
 
 The promise of that still and moonlit December 
 night, wherein we had bean- feasted with the 
 McRorys, was shamelessly broken. 
 
 The weather next morning was a welter of 
 wind and mist, with rain flung in at intervals. 
 The golden fox on the stable weathercock was 
 not at peace for a moment, facing all the southern 
 points of the compass as if they were hounds that 
 held it at bay. For my part, I do not know why 
 people go out hunting on such days, unless it be 
 for the reason that many people go to church, to 
 set an example to others. 
 
 Philippa said she went because she had done 
 her hair for riding before she could see out of the 
 window — a fiction beneath the notice of any 
 intelligent husband. I went because I had told 
 my new groom, Wilson (an English disciplinarian), 
 that I was going, and I was therefore caught in 
 the cogs of the inexorable wheel of stable routine. 
 I also went because I nourished a faint hope that 
 I might be able to place before the general public, 
 and especially before Flurry Knox, an authentic 
 
 225 P 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 first version of the McRory episode. More- 
 over, I had a headache ; but this I was not 
 going to mention, knowing that the sun never 
 sets upon the jests consecrated to after-dinner 
 headaches. 
 
 As we rode away from Shreelane, and felt the 
 thick small rain in our faces, and saw the spray 
 blown off the puddles by the wind, and heard the 
 sea-gulls, five miles inland, squealing in the mist 
 overhead, I said that it was preposterous to think 
 of hunting at Lonen Hill in such weather, and 
 that I was going home. Philippa said that we 
 might as well go on to the meet, to exercise the 
 horses, and that we could then come straight 
 home. (I have a sister who has said that I am a 
 lath painted to look like iron, and that Philippa is 
 iron painted to look like a lath.) 
 
 The meet was in shelter, the generous shelter 
 of Lonen Hill, which interposed itself between us 
 and the weather. There is just space for the 
 road, between the shore of Lough Lonen and the 
 southern face of the hill, that runs precipitously 
 up into the sky for some six hundred feet, dark 
 with fir-trees, and heather, and furze, fortified 
 with rock — a place renowned as a fastness for 
 foxes and woodcock (whose fancies as to desir- 
 able winter residences generally coincide). One 
 would have thought that only a pack of monkeys 
 
 226 
 
Vut Down One and Carry Two 
 
 could deal with such a covert, but hounds 
 went through it, and so did beaters — or said 
 they did. 
 
 We found the hounds waiting in an old quarry 
 under the side of the hill, and, a little farther on, 
 a very small and select company of waterproofs 
 was huddled under the branches of a fir-tree that 
 huno- over the road. As we neared them I recog^- 
 nised Miss Bennett's firm and capable back : she 
 was riding the black mare that she had come 
 over to ** pass on " to old McRory. It was 
 Philippa who pointed out that she was accom- 
 panied by Miss Larkie McRory, seated on a stout 
 and shaggy animal, whose grey hindquarters 
 were draped by the folds of its rider's voluminous 
 black macintosh, in a manner that recalled the 
 historic statue of the Iron Duke. Farther on, 
 Mrs. Flurry and her mother, the redoubtable 
 Lady Knox, were getting out of a motor and 
 getting themselves on to their horses. 
 
 " There's room under the umbrella for Mrs. 
 Yeates ! " called out Miss Bennett hospitably, 
 " but the Major must find one for himself, and a 
 very big one, too ! " 
 
 **We could make room for him here," said 
 Miss Larkie McRory, "if he liked to come." 
 
 I maintained, I hope, an imperturbable demean' 
 our, and passed on. 
 
 227 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 " Who is that ? " said Lady Knox, approach- 
 ing me, on her large and competent iron 
 grey. 
 
 I informed her, briefly, and without prejudice. 
 
 **Oh, one of that crew," said Lady Knox, 
 without further comment. 
 
 Lady Knox is not noted for receptive sympathy, 
 yet this simple statement indicated so pleasingly 
 our oneness of soul in the matter of the McRorys, 
 that I was on the verge of flinging overboard the 
 gendemanlike scruples proper to a guest, and 
 o-ivinof her the full details of last night's revel. 
 At this moment, however, her son-in-law came 
 forth from the quarry with his hounds, and his 
 coadjutors, Dr. Hickey and Michael, and moved 
 past us. 
 
 *'Yeates!" he called out, ** I'd be obliged to 
 you if you'd take that point up on the hill, on the 
 down-wind side, where he often breaks." He 
 looked at me with a serious, friendly face. '' He 
 won't break down, you know — it's only motors 
 do that." 
 
 This witticism, concocted, no doubt, in the 
 seclusion of the quarry, called for no reply on my 
 part — (or, to be accurate, no suitable reply pre- 
 sented itself). There was an undoubted titter 
 among the waterproofs ; I moved away upon my 
 mission at a dignified trot : a trot is seldom dlgni- 
 
 228 
 
Vut Down One and Carry Two 
 
 fied, but Daniel has dignity enough for himself 
 and his rider. 
 
 Daniel stands sixteen hands two inches in his 
 stockings, of which he wears one white one, the 
 rest of his enormous body being of that unlovely 
 bluish-dun colour to which a dark bay horse turns 
 when clipped. His best friend could not deny 
 that he ''made a noise"; his worst enemy was 
 fain to admit that he was glad to hear it in front 
 of him at a nasty place. Some one said that he 
 was like a Settled Religious Faith, and no lesser 
 simile conveys the restful certainty imparted by 
 him. It was annoying, no doubt, to hear people 
 say, after I had accomplished feats of consider- 
 able valour, that that horse couldn't make a mis- 
 take, and a baby could ride him ; but these were 
 mere chastenings, negligible to the possessor of a 
 Settled Religious Faith. 
 
 I trotted on through the rain, up a steep road 
 seamed with watercourses, with Lonen Hill 
 towering on my left, and a lesser hill on my right. 
 Looking back, I saw Flurry dismount, give his 
 horse to a boy, and clamber on to the wall of the 
 road : he dropped into the wood, and the hounds 
 swarmed over after him, looking like midgets 
 beside the tremendous citadel that they were to 
 attack. Hickey and Michael, equally dwarfed 
 by the immensities of the position, were already 
 
 229 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 betaking themselves through the mist to their 
 allotted outposts in space. Five-and-twenty couple 
 of hounds would have been little enough for that 
 great hill-side ; Flurry had fifteen, and with them 
 he began his tough struggle through the covert, 
 a solitary spot of red among pine-stems, and 
 heather, and rocks, cheering his fifteen couple 
 with horn and voice, while he climbed up and 
 up by devious ways, seemingly as marvellously 
 endowed with wind as the day itself. I cantered 
 on till, at the point where the wood ended, it be- 
 came my melancholy duty to leave the road and 
 enter upon the assault of the hill. I turned in at 
 a gap beside the guardian thorn-bush of a holy 
 well, on whose branches votive rags fluttered in 
 the wind, and addressed Daniel to his task of 
 carrying thirteen stone up an incline approxi- 
 mating to a rise of one in three. 
 
 A path with the angles of a flash of lightning 
 indicated the views of the local cow as to the 
 best method of dealing with the situation. Daniel 
 and I accepted this, as we had done more than 
 once before, and we laboured upwards, parallel 
 with the covert, while the wind, heavy with mist, 
 came down to meet us, and shoved against us 
 like a living thing. We gained at length a shelf 
 on the hill-side, and halting there in the shelter 
 of a furzy hummock, I applied myself to my job. 
 
 230 
 
"^iit Down One and Carry Two 
 
 From the shelf I commanded a long stretch of 
 the boundary wall of the wood, including a certain 
 gap which was always worthy of special attention, 
 and for a quarter of an hour I bent a zealous and 
 travelling gaze upon the wall, with the concentra- 
 tion of a professor of a Higher Thought Society. 
 As is not unusual in such cases, nothing 
 happened. At rare intervals a hint of the cry of 
 hounds was carried in the wind, evanescent as a 
 whiff from a summer garden. Once or twice it 
 seemed to swing towards me, and at such moments 
 the concentration of my eyeglass upon the gap 
 was of such intensity that had the fox appeared I 
 am confident that he would instantly have fallen 
 into a hypnotic trance. As time wore on I arrived 
 at the stage of obsession, when the music of the 
 hounds and the touches of the horn seemed to be 
 in everything, the wind, the streams, the tree 
 branches, and I could almost have sworn hounds 
 were away and running hard, until some vagrant 
 voice in the wood would dispel the mirage of 
 sound. This was followed by the reactionary 
 period of pessimism, when I seemed to myself 
 merely an imbecile, sitting in heavy rain, staring 
 at a stone wall. Half an hour, or more, passed. 
 
 ** I'm going out of this," I said to myself de- 
 fiandy ; ** there's reason in the roasting of eggs." 
 It seemed, however, my duty to go up rather 
 231 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 than down, and I coerced Daniel into the bed 
 of a stream, as offering the best going available. 
 It led me into a cleft between the hill-side and the 
 wall of the covert, which latter was, like a thing 
 in a fairy tale, changing very gradually from a 
 wall into a bank. I ascended the cleft, and 
 presently found that it, too, was changing its 
 nature, and becoming a flight of stairs. Daniel 
 clattered slowly and carefully up them, basing his 
 feet, like Sir Bedivere, on *' juts of slippery crag 
 that rang sharp-smitten with the dint of armed 
 heels." 
 
 We had reached the top in safety when I 
 heard a thin and wavering squeal behind me, 
 and looking back saw Miss Larkie McRory 
 ascending the rocky staircase on the grey cob, 
 at a speed that had obviously, and legitimately, 
 drawn forth the squeal. 
 
 "Oh, gracious! The brute! I can't stop 
 him ! " she cried as she rushed upon me. 
 
 The grey cob here bumped into Daniel's mas- 
 sive stern, rebounded, and subsided, for the ex- 
 cellent reason that no other course was open to 
 it. Miss McRory's reins were clutched in a 
 looped confusion, that summoned from some 
 corner of my brain a memory of the Sultan's 
 cipher on the Order of the Medjidie : her hat 
 was hanging down her back, and there was a 
 
 232 
 
^ut Down One and Carry Two 
 
 picturesqueness about her hair that promised 
 disaster later on. Her hazel eyes shone, and her 
 complexion glowed like a rose in rain. 
 
 " Mr. Irving's fit to be tied ! " she continued. 
 " His horse jumped about like a mad thing when 
 he saw those awful steps ! " 
 
 Sounds of conflict and clattering came from 
 below. I splashed onwards in the trough between 
 the hill and the fence, and had emerged into a 
 comparatively open space with my closely atten- 
 dant McRory, when the impassioned face of Mr. 
 Irving's Meath mare shot into view at the top 
 of the steps. The water in the trough was 
 apparently for her the limit of what should or 
 could be endured. She made a crooked spring 
 at the hill-side, slipped, and, recognising the bank 
 as the one civilised feature in a barbarous country, 
 bounced sideways on to the top of it, pivoted 
 there, and sat down backwards into a thicket of 
 young ash and hazel trees. A succession of 
 short yells from Miss McRory acclaimed each 
 phase of the incident ; Mr. Irving's face, as he 
 settled down amongst the branches, was as a 
 book where men might read strange matters, not 
 of an improving nature. 
 
 It was probably the reception accorded to the 
 bay mare by the branches and briars in which 
 she had seated herself that caused her to return 
 
 233 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 to the top of the bank in a kangaroo-bound, as 
 active as it was unexpected. Horses can do 
 these things when they choose, but they seldom 
 choose. From the top of the bank she dropped 
 into the trough, and joined us, with her nerves 
 still in a state of acute indignation, and less of 
 her rider in the saddle than is conventional, 
 but a dinge in his pot-hat appeared to be the 
 extent of the damage. Miss McRory's eye 
 travelled from it to me, but she abstained from 
 comment. It was the eye of a villain and a con- 
 spirator. I had by no means forgotten the in- 
 juries inflicted on me by her brothers, nor did I 
 forget that Flurry had said that there wasn't one 
 of the family but was as clever as the devil and 
 four times as unscrupulous. Yet, taken in con- 
 junction with the genuineness of her complexion, 
 and with the fact that Irving was probably twenty 
 years my junior, ** I couldn't " — as the song says 
 — **help smiling at McRory O'More" (behind 
 the back of young Mr. Irving, D.I.). 
 
 It transpired that Irving, from some point of 
 vantage below, shared, it would appear, with 
 Miss McRory, had seen the hounds running out of 
 the top of the wood, and had elected to follow 
 me. He did not know where any one was, had 
 not heard a sound of the horn, and gave it as his 
 opinion that Flurry was dead, and that trying to 
 
 234 
 
Tut Down One and Carry Two 
 
 hunt in this country was simply farcical. He 
 bellowed these things at me in his consequential 
 voice as we struggled up the hill against the 
 immense weight of wind, in all the fuss, anxiety, 
 and uncertainty out of which the joys of hunting 
 are born. It was as we topped the ultimate 
 ridge that, through the deafening declamations 
 of the wind, I heard, faint as a bar of fairy music, 
 distant harmonies as of hounds running. 
 
 The wind blew a hole in the mist, and we had 
 a bird's-eye view of a few pale-green fields far 
 below : across one of them some pigmy forms 
 were moving ; they passed over a dark line that 
 represented a fence, and proceeded into the heart 
 of a cloud. 
 
 '' That's about the limit," shouted Irving, drag- 
 ging at his mare's mouth, as she swerved from a 
 hole in the track. "It's only in this God-forsaken 
 country that a fox'd go away in the teeth of a 
 storm like this ! " 
 
 To justify to Mr. Irving the disregard of the 
 Lonen Hill foxes for the laws of the game was 
 not my affair. It seemed to me that in piloting 
 him and Miss McRory I was doing rather more 
 than humanity had any right to expect. I have 
 descended Lonen Hill on various occasions, none 
 of them agreeable, but never before with an 
 avalanche travelling hard on my heels — a com- 
 
 235 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 posite avalanche that slid, and rushed, and 
 dropped its hind-legs over the edge at bad 
 corners, and was throughout vocal with squeals, 
 exclamations, inquiries as to facts of which 
 Providence could alone be cognisant, and thun- 
 derous with objurgations. The hill-side merged 
 at length into upland pasture, strange little fields, 
 composed partly of velvet patches, like putting- 
 greens, predominantly of nightmare bunkers of 
 rocks and furze. We rushed downwards through 
 these, at a pace much accelerated by the pre- 
 valence of cattle gaps ; the bay mare, with her 
 head in the air, zigzagging in bounds as incal- 
 culable as those of a grasshopper ; the grey cob, 
 taking sole charge of Miss McRory, tobogganing 
 with her hind feet, propping with her fore, and 
 tempering her enthusiasm with profound under- 
 standing of the matter. Finally, a telegraph- 
 post loomed through the fog upon us, and a 
 gate discovered itself, through which we banged 
 in a bunch on to the high road. A cottage faced 
 us, with a couple of women and an old man 
 standing outside it. 
 
 To them we put the usual question, with the 
 usual vehemence (always suggestive of the 
 King's Troopers in romance, hotly demanding 
 information about a flying rebel). 
 
 " I didn't see a fox this long while," replied 
 236 
 
'Put Down One and Carry Two 
 
 the old man deliberately, *' but there was a few 
 jocks went west the road a while ago." 
 
 The King's Troopers, not specially enlightened, 
 turned their steeds and went in pursuit of the 
 jocks. A stone gap, flung in ruins among black 
 hoof-marks, soon gave a more precise indication, 
 and we left the road, with profound dubiety on 
 my part as to where we were going and how 
 we were going to get there. The first fence 
 decided the matter for Irving, D.I. It was a 
 bank on which slices of slatey stone had been 
 laid, much as in Germany slabs of cold sausage 
 are laid upon bread. The Meath mare looked 
 at it but once, and fled from it at a tangent; 
 the grey pony, without looking at it, followed 
 her. Daniel selected an interval between the 
 slabs, and took me over without comment. 
 Filled by a radiant hope that I had shaken off 
 both my companions, I was advancing in the 
 line of the hoof-tracks, when once more I heard 
 behind me on the wind cries as of a storm-driven 
 sea-gull, and the grey cob came up under my 
 stirrup, like a runaway steam pinnace laying 
 itself beside a man-o'-war. Miss McRory was 
 still in the saddle, but minus reins and stirrup ; 
 the wind had again removed her hat, which was 
 following her at full stretch of its string, like a 
 kite. Had it not been for her cries I should 
 
 237 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 have said, judging by her face, that she was 
 thoroughly enjoying herself. 
 
 Having achieved Daniel's society the cob pulled 
 up, and her rider, not without assistance from 
 me, restored her hat, reins, and stirrup to their 
 proper spheres. I looked back, and saw Irving's 
 mare, still on the farther side of the fence, her 
 nose pointing to the sky, as if invoking the pro- 
 tection of heaven, and I knew that for better 
 for worse Miss McRory was mine until we reached 
 the high road. No doubt the thing was to be : 
 as one of our own poets has sung of Emer and 
 Cuchulain, '* all who read my name in Erin's 
 story would find its loving letters linked with" 
 those of McRory. The paraphrase even rhymed 
 — another finger-mark of Fate. Yet it was hard 
 that, out of all the possible, and doubtless eager, 
 squires of the hunting-field I should have been 
 chosen. 
 
 The hoof-tracks bent through a long succes- 
 sion of open gaps to a farmyard, and there were 
 swallowed in the mire of a lane. I worked the 
 lane out for every inch it was worth, with the 
 misty rain pricking my face as it were with 
 needles, and the intention to go home at the 
 earliest possible opportunity perfecting itself in 
 my heart. But the lane, instead of conducting 
 us to the high road, melted disastrously into a 
 
 238 
 
^ut Down One and Carry Two 
 
 turf bog. I pulled up, and the long steady 
 booming of the sea upon the rocks made a deep 
 undertone to the wind. There was no voice of 
 hound or horn, and I was on the point of return- 
 ing to the farmhouse when the mist, in its stagey, 
 purposeful way, again lifted, and laid bare the 
 sky-line of a low hill on our left. A riderless 
 horse was limping very slowly along it, led by 
 something that seemed no higher than a toad- 
 stool. Obviously we were on the line of the 
 hunt, and obviously, also, it was my duty to 
 enquire into the matter of the horse. I turned 
 aside over a low bank, hotly followed by the 
 grey cob, and the wail to which I was now 
 becoming inured. As Miss McRory arrived 
 abruptly at my side, she cried that she would 
 have been off that time only for the grab she 
 got of his hair. (By which I believe she meant 
 the mare's mane.) 
 
 Fortune favoured us with broken-down fences ; 
 we overtook the horse, and found it was Flurry 
 Knox's brown mare, hobbling meekly in tow of 
 a very small boy. In one of her hind fedocks 
 there was a clean, sharp cut that might have 
 been done with a knife. 
 
 In answer to my questions the small boy 
 pointed ahead. I polished my eyeglass, and, 
 with eyes narrowed against the wind, looked into 
 
 239 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 the south-west, and there saw, unexpectedly, 
 even awfully near, the Atlantic Ocean, dingy 
 and angry, with a long line, as of battle-smoke, 
 marking its assault upon the cliffs. Between 
 the cliffs and the hill on which we were stand- 
 ing a dark plateau, striped with pale grey walls, 
 stretched away into the mist. 
 
 ** There's the huntsman for ye," squeaked the 
 little boy, who looked about six years old. 
 
 I descried at a distance of perhaps a quarter 
 of a mile a figure in a red coat, on foot, in the 
 act of surmounting one of the walls, accompanied 
 by a hovering flock of country boys. 
 
 " The dogs is out before him," pursued the 
 little boy at the full pitch of his lungs. " I seen 
 the fox, too. I'll go bail he has himself housed 
 in the Coosheen Grohogue by now." 
 
 "Gracious!" said Miss McRory. 
 
 I said he probably had a simpler telegraphic 
 address, and that, no matter where he was, it was 
 now my duty to overtake Mr. Knox and offer him 
 my horse ; *' and you," I added, '' had better get 
 this little boy to show you the way to the road." 
 
 Miss McRory replied confidently that she'd 
 sooner stay with me. 
 
 I said, as well as I remember, that her prefer- 
 ence was highly flattering, but that she might 
 
 live to regret it. 
 
 240 
 
^ut Down One and Carry Two 
 
 Miss McRory answered that she wished I 
 wouldn't be spying at her through that old glass 
 of mine ; she knew well enough she was a show, 
 and her hair was coming down, and she'd as soon 
 trust herself to the cat as to that litde urchin. 
 
 As I made my way downwards over the knife- 
 edged ridges of rock and along their intervening 
 boggy furrows, I should myself have been grate- 
 ful for the guidance of the cat. Even the grey 
 cob accepted the matter as serious, and kept the 
 brake hard on, accomplishing the last horrid 
 incident of the descent — a leap from the slant of 
 the hill on to the summit of a heathery bank — 
 without frivolity, even with anxiety. We had 
 now arrived at the plateau above the cliffs— 
 a place of brown, low-growing ling, complicated 
 by boggy runnels, and heavily sprinkled with 
 round stones. The mist was blowing in thicker 
 than ever, Flurry and his retinue were lost as 
 though they had never been, and the near 
 thunder of the breakers, combined with the wind, 
 made an impenetrable din round me and Miss 
 McRory. 
 
 After perhaps a mile, in the course of which I 
 got off several times to pull down loose walls for 
 the benefit of my companion, I discovered the 
 rudiments of a lane, which gradually developed 
 into a narrow but indubitable road. The rain 
 
 241 Q 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 had gone down the back of my neck and into my 
 boots : I determined that if Flurry had to finish 
 the run on all-fours, I would stick to the lane 
 until it took me to a road. What it took me to 
 was, as might have been foreseen in any County 
 Cork bohireen, a pole jammed across it from wall 
 to wall and reinforced by furze-bushes — not a 
 very high pole, but not one easy to remove. I 
 pulled up and looked dubiously from it to Miss 
 McRory. 
 
 *' D'ye dare me ?" she said. 
 
 *' I bet you sixpence you take a toss if you do," 
 I replied firmly, preparing to dismount. 
 
 *' Done with you ! " said Miss McRory, suddenly 
 smiting the grey cob with a venomous little 
 cutting whip (one that probably dated from the 
 sixties, and had for a handle an ivory grey- 
 hound's head with a plaited silver collar round 
 its neck). 
 
 I have seldom seen a pole better and more 
 liberally dealt with, as far as the grey cob's share 
 of the transaction went, and seldom, indeed, have 
 I seen a rider sail more freely from a saddle than 
 Miss McRory sailed. She alighted on her hands 
 and knees, and the cob, with the sting of the 
 whip still enlivening her movements, galloped on 
 up the lane and was lost in the mist. 
 
 "Well, you won your sixpence," said Miss 
 242 
 
^ut Down One and Carry Two 
 
 McRory dauntlessly, as I joined her. *' I suppose 
 you're delighted." 
 
 I assured her with entire sincerity that I was 
 very much the reverse, and proceeded at high 
 speed in pursuit of the cob. The result of this 
 excursion — a fairly prolonged one — was the dis- 
 covery that the lane led into a road, and that it 
 was impossible to decide in which direction the 
 fugitive had gone. I returned in profound gloom 
 to my young lady, and found her rubbing herself 
 down with a bunch of heather. 
 
 " So you couldn't ketch her ! " she called out as 
 I approached. " What'll we do now } " She was 
 evidently highly amused. ** I'll tell the Peeler it 
 was your fault. You dared me I " 
 
 My reply need not be recorded : I only know 
 it was by no means up to the standard to which 
 Miss McRory was accustomed. 
 
 I took what seemed to be the only possible 
 course, and established her seated sideways on 
 my saddle, with her foot — and it is but fair to say, 
 a very small foot — in the leather instead of the 
 stirrup, and her right hand knotted in Daniel's 
 mane. I held the off stirrup, and splashed beside 
 her in the ruts and mud. The mist was thicker 
 than ever, the wind was pushing it in from the 
 sea in great masses, and Miss McRory and I pro- 
 gressed onward in a magic circle of some twenty 
 
 243 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 yards in diameter, occupied only by herself and 
 me, with Daniel thrown in as chaperon. 
 
 On arriving at the road I relied on the wind for 
 guidance, and turning to the right, let it blow us 
 in what was, I trusted, our course. It was by 
 this time past three o'clock, we were at least nine 
 or ten miles from home, and one of my boots had 
 begun to rub my heel. There was nothing for it 
 but to keep on as we were going, until we met 
 something, or some one, or died. 
 
 It is worthy of record that in these afflicting 
 circumstances Miss Larkie McRory showed a 
 staying power, attained, probably, in the long and 
 hungry bicycle picnics of her tribe, that was 
 altogether commendable. Not for an instant did 
 she fail to maintain in me the belief that she 
 found me one of the most agreeable people she 
 had ever met, a little older, perhaps, than Irving, 
 D.I., but on that very account the more to be 
 confided in. It was not until the pangs of hunger 
 recalled to me the existence of my sandwiches that 
 I discovered she had no food with her, nor, as far 
 as could be gathered, had she had any breakfast. 
 
 **Sure they were all snoring asleep when 
 I started. I just got a cup o' tea in the 
 kitchen " 
 
 This, I suppose, was a point at which I might 
 suitably have said something incisive about the 
 
 244 
 
^ut Down One and Carry Two 
 
 feats of her brethren on the previous night, but 
 with deplorable weakness I merely offered her 
 my sandwiches. Miss McRory replied that she'd 
 fall off in a minute if she were to let go the mane, 
 and why wouldn't I eat them myself? I said if 
 there were any shelter left in Ireland I would 
 wait till I got there, and we could then decide 
 who should eat them. 
 
 ^ons of mist and solitude ensued. I must 
 have walked for an hour or more, without meet- 
 ing anyone except one old woman, who could 
 only speak Irish, and I had begun to feel as if my 
 spur were inside my boot instead of outside, 
 when I became aware of something familiar 
 about the look of the fences. It was not, how- 
 ever, until I felt shelter rising blessedly about us, 
 and saw the thorn bush with the rags hanging 
 from it, that I realised that our luck had turned, 
 and we had blundered our way back to the holy 
 well under the side of Lonen Hill. The well 
 was like a tiny dripping cave, about as big as a 
 beehive, with a few inches of water in it ; a great 
 boulder stood guard over it, and above it stooped 
 the ancient and twisted thorn bush. It seemed 
 indicated as a place of rest, none the less that my 
 heel was by this time considerably galled by my 
 boot. 
 
 Miss McRory glissaded from my saddle into 
 245 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 my arms, and was assisted by me to deposit 
 herself on a flat stone beside the well, stiff, wet, 
 but still undefeated. We shared my sandwiches, 
 we drank whisky mixed with the water of the 
 holy well, and Miss McRory dried her face with 
 her handkerchief, and her complexion looked 
 better than ever. Daniel, slowly and deliberately, 
 ate the rags off the thorn bush. I have been at 
 many picnics that I have enjoyed less. 
 
 By the time we had got to the gingerbread 
 biscuits I had discovered that Mr. Irving thought 
 she had talked too much to me after dinner last 
 night, and that it was a wonder to her how men 
 could be so cross about nothing. I said I was 
 sorry she called it nothing, at which she looked 
 up at me and down again at the gingerbread, and 
 did not reply. After this I felt emboldened to 
 ask her why she had been called so inappropriate 
 a name as ** Larkie." 
 
 Miss McRory agreed that it was indeed a silly 
 old name, and that it was a friend of one of her 
 brothers, a Mr. Mulcahy, who had said that she 
 and her sisters were '**Lorky little gurls with 
 lorge dork eyes.' He had that way of speaking," 
 she added, "because he thought it was grand, 
 and he always kept his watch at English time. 
 He said he ran over to London so often it wasn't 
 worth while to change it." 
 
 246 
 
^ut Down One and Carry Two 
 
 She herself had never been out of Ireland, and 
 she supposed she'd never get the chance. 
 
 I said that when she married Mr. Mulcahy she 
 could keep her watch at Irish time, so as to 
 equalise things. 
 
 Miss McRory suggested that I should give her 
 a watch as a wedding present, and that, English 
 or Irish time, it would be all hours of the night 
 before we were home. 
 
 I realised with a slight shock that the position 
 had indeed become inverted when one of the 
 House of McRory had to remind me, after about 
 four hours in her undiluted society, of the flight 
 of time. It was now past four, which was bad 
 enough, and a still greater shock awaited me in 
 the discovery that I was dead lame, the interval 
 of repose having been fatal to my damaged 
 
 heel. 
 
 I have always asserted, and shall continue to 
 do so to my dying day, that the way out of the 
 difficulty was suggested by Miss McRory. I 
 mounted Daniel, Miss McRory ascended the 
 boulder by the holy well, announcing that she 
 was as stiff as fifty crutches, and that once she 
 got up she'd be there for life. The thing was 
 done somehow, thanks to the incomparable for- 
 bearance of Daniel, and with Miss McRory seated 
 behind me on his broad back, and her arms 
 
 247 
 
In Mr. Knox^s Country 
 
 clasped round my waist, I once more, and very 
 cautiously, took the road. 
 
 Daniel continued to conduct himself like a 
 gentleman, but considering how precarious was 
 the position of Miss McRory, it was unnerving 
 to feel her shaken by silent and secret laughter. 
 
 '* You'll fall off," I warned her. 
 
 She replied by a further paroxysm, and asked 
 me what size I took in stays — she supposed about 
 forty inches. 
 
 Dusk was now an accomplished fact : thickened 
 with fog and rain, it was even turning to darkness 
 as we descended the long hill. But, humanly 
 speaking, the end was in sight. There was, I 
 knew, a public-house a couple of miles farther on, 
 where a car might be hired, and there I proposed 
 to bid a long farewell to Miss Larkie McRory, 
 and to send her home by herself, to have rheumatic 
 fever, as I assured her. 
 
 We moved on and on, at a careful foot-pace : 
 we were out in the wind again, and it was very 
 cold. It was also quite dark. Silence fell upon 
 us, and, after a time, the sustained pressure of 
 Miss McRory's hat-brim against my shoulder 
 suggested that it was the silence of exhaustion, if 
 not of sleep. I thought of her with compassion. 
 I believe I formulated her to myself as a poor little 
 girl, and found myself asserting with defiance to 
 
 248 
 
^ut Down One and Carry Two 
 
 imaginary detractors that no one could say she 
 hadn't pluck, and that, in spite of her family, she 
 really had a soul to be saved. 
 
 Again we found ourselves in shelter, and a 
 greater darkness in the darkness told that we 
 were in the lee of a wooded hill. I knew where 
 I was now, and I said to Miss McRory that the 
 pub was just round the corner, and she replied 
 at once that that was where they always were, in 
 Dublin anyway. She also said she thought she 
 heard horses' hoofs coming up behind us. I 
 pushed on. 
 
 We turned the corner, and were immediately 
 struck blind by the twin glare of the lamps of a 
 motor, that lay motionless, as in ambush, at the 
 side of the road. Even the equanimity of Daniel 
 was shattered ; he swung to one side, he drifted 
 like a blown leaf, and Miss McRory clung to me 
 like a knapsack. As we curveted in the full 
 glare of the limelight, I was aware of a figure in 
 a pot-hat and a vast fur coat standing near the 
 motor. Even as I recognised Lady Knox three 
 or four muddy hounds trailed wearily into the 
 glare, and a voice behind me shouted, ** 'Ware 
 horse ! " 
 
 ^ Flurry came on into the light : there was just 
 room in me for a sub-conscious recognition of the 
 fact that he was riding the missing grey cob, and 
 
 249 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 that this was a typical thing, and one that might 
 have been expected. 
 
 At the hunt dinner that took place soon after- 
 wards some one sang a song, one that I have 
 ceased to find amusing. The first verse runs as 
 
 follows : 
 
 " Throttin' to the Fair, 
 Me and Moll Moloney, 
 Sittin', I declare, 
 
 On a single pony " 
 
 By a singular coincidence, the faces of all 
 those present turned towards me. 
 
 250 
 
X 
 
 THE COMTE DE PRALINES 
 
 " I HAD forgotten how nice London is ! " purred 
 Philippa, as we moved beautifully across the 
 threshold of Bill Cunningham's club, and were 
 conducted to the lift with a tender deference that 
 was no more than was due to our best clothes. 
 
 The Ladies" Tea-room at BilFs club was a 
 pleasant place, looking forth, high above the 
 noise, upon trees that were yellow in the hazy 
 October afternoon. In a very agreeable bow- 
 window were Lady Derryclare and the tea-table, 
 and with her were her son, and a small and orna- 
 mental young man, who was introduced to us as 
 Mr. Simpson-Hodges. 
 
 ''Front name John, known to a large circle 
 of admirers as ' Mossoo,'" supplemented Bill, 
 whose hands were so clean that I found it 
 difficult to recognise him. 
 
 *'So called because of the incredible circum- 
 stance that he can speak French, in spite of the 
 best Public School education," said Lady Derry- 
 clare. '* When I think of the money that has been 
 wasted on you ! You good for nothing creature ! " 
 
 251 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 "It's more his looks," pursued Bill, ** his dark 
 foreign beauty 
 
 ** These humorists ! " said Mr. Simpson- Hodges 
 indulgently, showing a set of white teeth under 
 a diminutive black moustache. ** Please, Lady 
 Derryclare, let's talk of something pleasant." 
 
 "Ask him about the chickens you made him 
 get from the Chicken Farmers for the dance his 
 regiment gave," said Bill to his mother. 
 
 " Oh, that was rather a bad business," said 
 Mr. Simpson- Hodges apologetically, with an eye 
 on Philippa, who, in a new hat, was looking about 
 five-and-twenty. "I'm sure no one wants to hear 
 about it." 
 
 " Mossoo ran the supper and he ordered three 
 brace," said Bill, " but they never turned up till 
 the week after the show ! The postman was 
 viewed coming up to the Mess towing something 
 after him on a long painter. The painter was 
 superfluous. The chickens would have followed 
 him at a trot if he had been kind to them. They 
 kept them for the drag, I believe. Didn't you, 
 Mossoo? He's one of the Whips, you know." 
 
 " They'd have been quite useful," admitted Mr. 
 Simpson-Hodges. 
 
 " How interesting to be a Whip! " said Philippa, 
 looking at him with egregious respect. 
 
 "Rather too interesting, sometimes," replied 
 252 
 
T^he Comte de 'Pralines 
 
 Simpson-Hodges, expanding to the glance in a 
 way not unfamiliar to me. '' Last time we were 
 out the fellow with the drag started from 
 the cross-roads where we were going to meet, 
 and was asinine enough to take it a bit down 
 the road before he went into the country, and, 
 as it happened, we were bringing the hounds 
 up to the meet by that particular road. They 
 simply put down their heads and ran it heel for 
 all they were worth ! The First Whip and I 
 galloped our best, but we couldn't get to their 
 heads, and we all charged into the middle of the 
 meet full -cry 1 " 
 
 " Oh ! I wish I had been there ! " said Philippa 
 ardently. 
 
 *• We wished we were anywhere else," replied 
 Mr. Simpson-Hodges; ''the Brigadier was there, 
 and everybody. We heard all about it after- 
 wards, I can tell you ! " 
 
 ** That ought to have happened in Mr. Knox's 
 country, Major Yeates!" said Lady Derryclare, 
 whose interest in fox-hunting was more sym- 
 pathetic than technical. 
 
 " We don't run drags. Lady Derryclare," I said 
 reproachfully, but Lady Derryclare had already 
 entered upon another topic. 
 
 Simpson- Hodges, however, did not end there. 
 
 253 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 A week afterwards Philippa and I crept home, 
 third class, with full trunks and empty pockets, 
 sustained only by the aphorism, evolved by my 
 wife, that economies, and not extravagances, are 
 what one really regrets. It was approaching the 
 end of November before we next heard of Simp- 
 son-Hodges. The Derryclares had come down for 
 their first woodcock shoot, and Bill swooped over 
 one morning in the big Daimler and whirled us 
 back with him over the forty intervening miles of 
 bog and mountain, to shoot, and to dance on the 
 carpet after dinner, and to act charades ; to 
 further, in short, the various devices for exer- 
 cising and disciplining a house party. Mr. 
 John Simpson-Hodges was there, no less orna- 
 mental than in London, and as useful as he was 
 ornamental. He shot well, he danced beautifully, 
 and he made of the part of a French Count in a 
 charade so surprising a work of art that people 
 said — as is the habit of people — that he ought to 
 be making a hundred a week on the stage. 
 
 Before we left the Derryclares Philippa told me 
 that she had arranged with ** those boys" — by 
 which she referred to Mr. Cunningham and the 
 French Count — to come over next week and have 
 a hunt with Flurry Knox's hounds. Something 
 whispered to me that there was more in this than 
 met the eye, but as they were to provide their own 
 
 254 
 
T^he Comte de 'Pralines 
 
 mounts the position was unassailable, and I con- 
 tented myself with telling her that a predilection for 
 the society of the young was one of the surest 
 signs of old age. 
 
 It was not till we were all seated at breakfast 
 on the morning of the meet (which was to be at 
 Castle Knox), that it was suggested, with all the 
 spontaneity of a happy thought, by Bill, that 
 '«Mossoo" should be introduced to the members 
 of the Hunt as a Frenchman who was unable to 
 speak English. 
 
 "Call him the Comte de Pralines," said Philippa, 
 with suspicious promptitude. 
 
 *'You can call him Napoleon Buonaparte if 
 you like," I said defiantly, 'V shall stay at home ! " 
 
 '* All the Curranhilty people will be there," said 
 Philippa softly. 
 
 The thought of introducing the Comte de 
 Pralines to Miss Bobbie Bennett was certainly 
 attractive. 
 
 *'I refuse to introduce him to Lady Knox," 
 I said with determination, and knew that I had 
 
 yielded. 
 
 A meet at Castle Knox always brought out 
 a crowd ; there were generally foxes, and always 
 luncheon, and there was a touch of the G.O.C. 
 about Lady Knox that added a pleasing edge 
 of anxiety, and raised the meet to something of 
 
 255 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 the nature of a full-dress parade. I held to my 
 point about Lady Knox, and did nothing more 
 compromising than tremble in the background, 
 while Bill Cunningham presented the Comte de 
 Pralines to the lady of the house, supplementing 
 the presentation with the statements that this 
 was his first visit to Ireland, and that he spoke 
 no English. 
 
 The Comte de Pralines, in the newest of pink 
 coats, and the whitest of breeches, and the most 
 glittering of boots and spurs, stood on the step 
 below Lady Knox, with the bridle of his hireling 
 over his arm, and his shining silk hat in his 
 hand. Still with his hat in his hand, and looking, 
 as Miss Larkie McRory whispered to me, **as 
 pretty as a Christmas card,'* the Count rippled 
 forth a stream of mellifluous French, comment- 
 ing upon the beauty of the day, of the place, of 
 the scene. 
 
 Lady Knox's face deepened to so apoplectic 
 a crimson, and her eyes became so fixed that I, 
 watching the scene apprehensively, doubted if it 
 were not my duty to rush at her and cut open 
 her hunting-stock. When the Count ceased, 
 having, as far as I could gather, enquired as to 
 when she had last been to Auteuil, and if she 
 had ever hunted in France, Lady Knox paused, 
 and said very slowly : 
 
 256 
 
The Comte de Pralines 
 
 " Y.x—f espere que nous au7^ons un bon jour 
 aujourdhuir Then, rapidly, to me, ** Take your 
 friend in for a drink, Major Yeates." 
 
 My heart bled for her, and also quaked for 
 myself, but I was into it now, up to my chin. 
 
 During the next ten minutes Bill Cunningham, 
 feebly abetted by me, played the game remorse- 
 lessly, sparing neither age nor sex. In the hall, 
 amidst the sloe-gfins and the whiskies and sodas 
 (to which the Count, for a foreigner, took re- 
 markably kindly), introductions slipped between 
 cup and lip, poisoning the former and paralysing 
 the latter. The victims took it variously ; some 
 sought refuge in bright smiles and large foreign 
 gestures ; some, in complete mental overthrow, 
 replied in broken English to Mossoo's sugared 
 periods ; all were alike in one point, they moved 
 as swiftly as might be, and as far as possible, 
 out of the immediate neis^hbourhood of the 
 Comte de Pralines. Philippa, who, without any 
 solid attainment, can put up a very good bluff in 
 French, joined spasmodically in these encounters, 
 alternately goading Mossoo to fresh outrages, 
 and backing out when the situation became too 
 acute. I found her, affecting to put her sand- 
 wiches into the case on her saddle, and giving 
 way to her feelings, with her face pressed against 
 her mare's shoulder. 
 
 257 R 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 " I introduced him to Bobbie Bennett," she 
 said brokenly ; ** and he asked her if she spoke 
 French. She looked at me as if she were drown- 
 ing, and said, * Seulement tres petit ' / " 
 
 I said, repressively, that Lady Knox could see 
 her, and that people would think, firstly, that she 
 was crying, and secondly, that she was mad. 
 
 **But I am mad, darling!" replied my wife, 
 turning a streaming face to me. 
 
 I informed her of my contempt for her, and, 
 removing myself from her vicinity, collected my- 
 self for the introduction of the Count to Flurry 
 Knox and Dr. Hickey. By this time most of the 
 Field were mounted, and the Comte de Pralines 
 bent to his horse's mane as he uncovered with 
 grave courtesy on his presentation to the Master 
 and the First Whip, and proceeded to express 
 the profundity of his gratification at meeting an 
 Irish Master of Hounds. The objects of the 
 attention were palpably discomposed by it ; 
 Flurry put a finger to his cap, with a look at 
 me expressive of No Surrender ; Dr. Hickey, in 
 unconscious imitation of the Count, bowed low, 
 but forgot about his cap. 
 
 ** He has no English, I'm told," said Flurry, 
 eyeing the Count suspiciously. 
 
 I stopped myself on the verge of bowing assent, 
 so infectious was the grace of the Pralines manner. 
 
 258 
 
i.^±> i^cii^xi:. 
 
T^he Comte de Pralines 
 
 " Is he come to buy horses for the German 
 Army?" went on Flurry. (It need hardly be 
 said that this occurred before the War.) 
 
 I explained that he was French. 
 
 ** You wouldn't know what these foreigners 
 might be up to," returned Mr. Knox, quite un- 
 convinced. ** I'm going on now " 
 
 He too moved expeditiously out of the danger 
 zone. 
 
 The Field straggled down the avenue, and 
 progressed over tracts of tussocky grass in the 
 wake of the hounds, towards the plantation that 
 was the first draw. The Keeper was outside the 
 wood, with the assurance that there was a score 
 of foxes in it, and that they had the country ate. 
 
 '' Maybe they'll eat the hounds, so," said 
 Flurry. " Let you all stay outside. You can be 
 talking French now for a bit " 
 
 I looked round to see who were availing them- 
 selves of this permission. The Count had by 
 this time been introduced to Miss Larkie 
 McRory ; Philippa was apparently acting as 
 interpreter, and Miss McRory was showing no 
 disposition to close the interview. The Field 
 had withdrawn, and had formed itself into a 
 committee-meeting on the Count. 
 
 It was warm and sunny in the shelter of the 
 wood. Although the time was November there 
 
 259 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 were still green leaves on some of the trees ; it 
 was a steamy day after a wet night, and I 
 thought to myself that if the hounds did run — 
 Here came a challenge from the wood, answered 
 multitudinously, and the next minute they were 
 driving through the laurels towards the entrance 
 gates, with a cry that stimulated even the many- 
 wintered Daniel to capers quite unbefitting his 
 time of life, or mine. The Castle Knox demesne 
 is a large one, and being surrounded by a pro- 
 hibitively high and coped wall, it is easier to find 
 a fox there than to get away with one. Mighty 
 galloping on the avenues followed, with inter- 
 ludes in the big demesne fields, where every gate 
 had been considerately left open, and in which 
 every horse with any pretensions to s avoir fair e 
 stiffened his neck, and put up his back, and 
 pulled. The hounds, a choir invisible, carried 
 their music on through the plantations, with 
 whimpering, scurrying pauses, with strophe and 
 anti-strophe of soprano and bass. Sometimes 
 the cry bore away to the demesne v^all, and 
 some one would shout ** They're away ! " and 
 the question of the Front Gate versus the 
 Western Gate would divide us like a sword. 
 Twice, in the undergrowth, above the sunk fence 
 that separated us from the wood, the quick, com- 
 posed face of the fox showed itself ; at last, when 
 
 260 
 
l^he Comte de Pralines 
 
 things were getting too hot in the covert, he 
 sprang like a cat over the ditch, and flitted across 
 the park with that gliding gait that dissimulates 
 its own speed, while I and my fellows offered a 
 painful example of the discordance of the human 
 voice when compared with that of the hound, 
 and five or six couple pitched themselves out of 
 the wood and stretched away over the grass. 
 
 It was fortunate for the Comte de Pralines 
 that his entirely British view-holloa was pro- 
 jected for the most part into my ear (the drum 
 of which it nearly split) and was merged in the 
 general enthusiasm as we let ourselves go. 
 
 "For God's sake. Major Yeates!" said 
 Michael, the Second Whip, thundering up 
 beside me as we neared the covert on the 
 further side of the park, " come into the wood 
 with me and turn them hounds! Mr. Flurry's 
 back on another fox with the body of the pack, 
 and he's very near his curse ! " 
 
 I followed Michael into the covert, and was 
 myself followed by a section of the Field, who 
 might, with great advantage, have remained 
 outside. In the twinkling of an eye Michael 
 was absorbed into the depths of the wood ; so 
 also were the six couple, but not so my retinue, 
 who pursued me like sleuth-hounds, as I traversed 
 the covert at such speed as the narrow rides per- 
 
 261 
 
In Mr. Knoxs Country 
 
 mitted. I made at length the negative discovery 
 that it contained nothing save myself and my 
 followers, a select party, consisting of the Comte 
 de Pralines, Miss McRory, Miss Bobbie Bennett, 
 Lady Knox's coachman on a three-year-old, and 
 a little boy in knickerbockers, on a midget pony 
 with the bearing of a war-horse and a soul to 
 match. We had come to a baffled pause at the 
 cross-ways, when faint and far away, an indis- 
 putable holloa was borne to us. 
 
 •'They've gone out the West Gate,*' said the 
 coachman, from among the tree- trunks into which 
 he had considerately manoeuvred the kicking end 
 of the three-year-old. ** It must be they ran 
 him straight out into the country " 
 
 We made for the West Gate, reached it with- 
 out sight or sound of Flurry or anyone else, and, 
 on the farm road outside it, pulled up to listen. 
 
 The holloa was repeated ; half a mile ahead a 
 gesticulating figure signalled to us to come on. 
 I wish to put it on record that I said I could not 
 hear the hounds. The Comte de Pralines (ex- 
 citable, like all Frenchmen) spurred his hireling 
 at the opposite bank, saying, as he shot past 
 me : 
 
 " It's no damned use humbugging here any 
 longer! " 
 
 As I turned Daniel to follow him, my eyes 
 262 
 
The Comte de Pralines 
 
 met those of Miss Larkie McRory, alight with 
 infernal intelligence ; they challenged, but at the 
 same time they offered confederacy. I jumped 
 into the field after the Count; Miss McRory 
 followed. 
 
 " I'll tell Lady Knox on you!" she murmured, 
 as she pounded beside me on the long-legged 
 spectre, who, it may be remembered, had been 
 described as **the latther end of a car-horse." 
 
 The holloa had come to us from the side of 
 a smooth green hill, and between us and it was 
 a shallow valley, neatly fenced with banks that 
 did credit to Sir Valentine Knox's farming. 
 The horses were fresh, the valley smiled in the 
 conventional way, and spread sleek pastures be- 
 fore us ; we took the down grade at a cheerful 
 pace, and the banks a shade faster than was 
 orthodox, and the coachman's three-year-old made 
 up in enthusiasm what he lacked in skill, and 
 the pony, who from the first was running away, 
 got over everything by methods known only to 
 itself. The Comte de Pralines held an undeviat- 
 ing line for the spot whence the holloa had 
 proceeded ; when we reached it there was no 
 one to be seen, but there was another holloa 
 further on. The pursuit of this took us on to 
 a road, and here the Castle Knox coachman, 
 who had scouted on ahead, yelled something to 
 
 263 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 the effect that he saw a rider out before him, 
 accompanying the statement by an application 
 of the spurs to the dripping but undaunted three- 
 year-old. A stretching gallop up the road ensued, 
 headed by the little boy and the coachman, who 
 had both secured a commanding lead. The pace 
 held for about a hundred yards, when the road 
 bent sharply to the left, more sharply indeed 
 than was anticipated by the leaders, who, as their 
 mounts skidded as it were on one wheel round 
 the corner, sailed from their saddles with singular 
 unanimity and landed in the ditch. At the 
 same moment the rider we had been following 
 came into view ; he was a priest, in immaculate 
 black coat and top-hat, seated on a tall chestnut 
 horse, and proceeding at a tranquil footpace on 
 his own affairs. 
 
 He had seen the fox, he admitted (I am in- 
 clined to think he had headed him), and he had 
 heard a man shouting, but no hounds had come 
 his way. He was entirely sympathetic, and, 
 warm as I was at the moment, a chill apprehen- 
 sion warned me that we might presently need 
 sympathy. 
 
 "■ It's my belief," said Miss Bennett, voicing 
 that which I had not put into words, "we've 
 been riding after the fox, and the hounds didn't 
 leave the covert at all ! " 
 
 264 
 
The Comte de 'Pralines 
 
 An elaborate French oath from the Count fell, 
 theatrical as a drop-scene, on the close of the 
 first act. Miss Larkie McRory looked at him 
 admiringly, and allowed just the last rays of her 
 glance to include me. 
 
 It was when we had retraced our steps to the 
 bend of the road that we had a full view of the 
 Castle Knox coverts, crowning in gold and 
 brown those pleasant green slopes, easy as the 
 descent to Avernus, down which we had galloped 
 with such generous ardour some fifteen minutes 
 ago. Outside the West Gate, through which 
 we had emerged from the demesne, were three 
 motionless figures in scarlet ; Lady Knox and her 
 grey horse were also recognisable ; a few hounds 
 were straying undecidedly in the first of the grass 
 fields that we had traversed. 
 
 A note of the horn leaped to us across the 
 valley, an angry and peremptory note. One of 
 the scarlet figures started at a canter and turned 
 the hounds. Another and longer blast followed. 
 As if in obedience to its summoning, the coach- 
 man's three-year-old came ramping, riderless, 
 down the road ; he passed us with his head high 
 in air and his flashing eye fixed upon the distant 
 group, and, with a long shrill neigh, put his tail 
 over his back and directed his flight for his 
 owner and her grey horse. 
 
 265 
 
In Mr, Knoxs Country 
 
 " God help poor Tierney ! " said Miss Bennett, 
 in a stricken voice, ** and ourselves too ! I believe 
 they saw us all the time, and we galloping away 
 on the line of the fox ! " 
 
 " I'm going home," I said. "Will you kindly 
 make my apologies to the Master ? " 
 
 ** I'll kindly do no such thing," replied Miss 
 Bennett. ** I'll let Flurry Knox cool off a bit 
 before I meet him again, and that won't be this 
 side of Christmas, if / can help it! Good-bye, 
 dear friends ! " 
 
 She turned her mare, and set her face for her 
 own country. 
 
 There now remained only the Count, Miss 
 McRory, and myself, and to remove ourselves 
 from the field of vision of the party at the gate 
 was our first care. We had, no doubt, been 
 thoroughly identified, nevertheless the immediate 
 sensation of getting a furzy hill between us and 
 Flurry was akin to that of escaping from the 
 rays of a burning-glass. In shelter we paused 
 and surveyed each other. 
 
 The Comte de Pralines, with his shiny hat 
 very much on the back of his head, put down his 
 reins, shoved his crop under his knee, and got 
 out his cigarette case. 
 
 ''Well," he began philosophically, sfriking a 
 
 match, " our luck ain't in ! " 
 
 266 
 
The Comte de Tralines 
 
 He broke off, the match went out, and a lively 
 glow suffused his unsheltered countenance. 
 
 " Vous voyez mon cher—'' he resumed, very 
 rapidly, ''fat appris quelqites petits mots " 
 
 "What a lovely English accent he has!" 
 interrupted Miss McRory rapturously ; ** it's a 
 lot nicer than his French one. To look at him 
 you'd never think he was so clever. It's a pity 
 he wouldn't try to pick up a little more." 
 
 " Now, that's hitting a man when he's down," 
 said the Comte de Pralines. ** I want some one 
 to be kind to me. I've had a poor day of it; 
 no one would talk to me. I stampeded them 
 wherever I went." 
 
 *' I didn't notice Miss McRory stampeding to 
 any great extent," I said. 
 
 ''Wait awhile ! " rejoined Miss McRory. "May- 
 be the stampeding will be going the other way 
 when you and he meet Lady Knox ! " 
 
 " I shan't wait an instant," said the Comte 
 de Pralines, " you and Major Yeates will ex- 
 plam. 
 
 The horses had been moving on, and the 
 covert was again in sight, about a quarter of a 
 mile away on our left. There was nothing to 
 be seen, but hounds were hunting again in 
 the demesne ; their cry drove on through the 
 
 267 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 woods inside the grey demesne wall ; they were 
 hunting in a body, and they were hunting 
 hard. 
 
 At each moment the cry was becoming more 
 remote, but it was still travelling on inside the 
 wall. The fear of Flurry fell from us as a gar- 
 ment, and the only question that presented 
 itself was whether to return to the West Gate 
 or to hold on outside. It was a long-accepted 
 theory at Castle Knox that the demesne wall 
 was not negotiable, and that the foxes always 
 used the gates, like Christians ; bearing this in 
 mind, I counselled the Front Gate and the out- 
 side of the wall. A couple of lanes favoured 
 us ; we presently found ourselves in a series of 
 marshy fields, moving along abreast of the in- 
 visible hounds in the wood. They were in the 
 thickest and least accessible part of it, and 
 Flurry's voice and horn came faintly as from a 
 distance. 
 
 I explained that it was impossible to ride that 
 part of the wood, but that, if they held on as 
 they were going, the Front Gate would make 
 it all right for us, and of course Flurry 
 would 
 
 **Oh! look, look, look!" shrieked Miss 
 McRory, snatching at my arm and pointing with 
 her whip. 
 
 268 
 
The Comte de Pralines 
 
 A short way ahead of us a huge elm tree had 
 fallen upon the wall ; the greenish-yellow leaves 
 still clinging to its branches showed that the 
 catastrophe was recent. It had broken down 
 the wall to within five or six feet of the ground, 
 and was reclining in the breach that it had 
 made, with its branches sprawling in the field. 
 I followed the line of Miss Larkie's whip, and 
 was just in time to see a fox float like a red 
 leaf from one of these to the ground, and glide 
 straight across our front. He passed out of 
 sight over a bank, and the Count stood up in 
 his stirrups, put his finger in his ear, and 
 screamed in a way that must have been heard 
 in the next county. I contributed a not in- 
 effective bellow, and Miss McRory decorated the 
 occasion with long thin squeals. 
 
 The hounds, inside the wall, answered in an 
 agony that was only allayed by the discovery 
 that the trunk of the tree formed as handy a 
 bridge for them as for the fox. They came 
 dropping like ripe fruit through the branches, 
 and, under our rejoicing eyes, swarmed to the 
 fox's line, and flung on, in the fullest of full-cry, 
 over the bank on which we had last seen him. 
 I have not failed to assure Flurry Knox that 
 anything less suggestive of " sneaking away with 
 the hounds" than the manner of our departure 
 
 269 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 could hardly be conceived, but Mr. Knox has 
 not withdrawn the phrase. 
 
 It may be conceded that Flurry had grounds 
 for annoyance. Had I had the fox in one hand 
 and the Ordnance Map in the other, I could 
 hardly have improved on the course steered by 
 our pilot. Up hill for a bit, when the horses 
 were fresh, with gradients just steep enough to 
 temper Daniel's well-sustained tug of war, yet 
 not so steep as to make a three-foot bank look 
 like a house, or to guarantee a big knee at each 
 ''stone gap." Then high and dry country, with 
 sheep huddled in defensive positions in the 
 corners of the fields, and grass like a series of 
 putting-greens, minus the holes, and fat, comely 
 banks, and thin walls, from which the small 
 round stones rattled harmlessly as Miss McRory's 
 car-horse swept through them. Down into a 
 long valley, with little sky-blue lakes, set in 
 yellow sedge ; and there was a helpful bog road 
 there, that nicked nicely with the bending line 
 of the hounds through the accompanying bog, 
 and allayed a spasm of acute anxiety as to 
 whether we should ever get near them again. 
 Then upwards once more, deviously, through 
 rougher going, with patches of low-growing furze 
 sprouting from blackened tracts where the hill- 
 side had been set on fire, with the hounds coming 
 
 270 
 
The Comte de Pralines 
 
 to their noses among brakes of briars and bracken; 
 finally, in the wind and sun of the hill-top, a well- 
 timed check. 
 
 We looked back for the first time, half in fear 
 that we might find Flurry hot on our track, half 
 in hope that he and his horn were coming to our 
 help ; but neither in the green country nor in the 
 brown valley was there any sign or sound of 
 him. There was nothing to be seen but a couple 
 of men standing on a fence to watch us, nothing 
 to be heard except cur dogs vociferating at every 
 cottage. 
 
 ** Fifteen couple on," said the Count profes- 
 sionally. *' How many does Knox usually have 
 out?" 
 
 " All he's got," I said, mopping my brow. 
 
 ** I don't see the two that have no hair on 
 their backs," said Miss McRory, whose eyes, 
 much enhanced by the radiant carmine of her 
 cheeks, beamed at us through wisps and loops 
 of hair. ** I know them, they're always scratch- 
 ing, the poor things I " 
 
 That Miss McRory and her steed kept, as 
 they did, their place in what is known to history 
 as the Great Castle Knox Run, is a matter that 
 I do not pretend to explain. Some antiquarian 
 has unearthed the fact that the car-horse had 
 three strains of breeding, and had twice been 
 
 271 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 second in a Point-to-PoInt ; but I maintain that 
 credit must be ascribed to Miss Larkie, about 
 whom there is something inevitable ; some street- 
 boy quality of being in the movement. 
 
 We were now on a heathery table-land, with 
 patches of splashy, rushy ground, from which the 
 snipe flickered out as the hounds cast themselves 
 through it. Presently, on the top of a hard, peaty 
 bank, a hound spoke, hesitatingly, yet hopefully, 
 and plunged down on the other side ; the pack 
 crowded over, and drove on through the heather. 
 Daniel changed feet on a mat of ling with a large 
 stone in it, and therefrom ramped carefully out 
 over a deep cut in the peat, unforeseen, and 
 masked by tufts of heather. The hireling of the 
 Comte de Pralines had, up to this, done his work 
 blamelessly, if without originality ; he had an 
 anxiousness to oblige that had been matured 
 during a dread winter when he had been the 
 joint property of three subalterns, but he reserved 
 to himself a determination to drop economically 
 off his banks, and boggy slits were not in his list 
 of possibilities. 
 
 How the matter occurred I do not know, but, 
 when I looked round, his head alone was visible, 
 and the Count was standing on his in the heather. 
 Miss McRory's car-horse, who had pulled up in 
 the act of following the Count, with a suddenness 
 
 272 
 
The Comte de Pralines 
 
 acquired, no doubt, in the shafts of a Cork covered- 
 car, was viewing the scene with horror from the 
 summit of the bank. The hounds were by this 
 time clear of the heather, and were beginning to 
 run hard ; it was not until I was on the further 
 side of the next bank that I cast another fleeting 
 look back ; this time the Count was standing on 
 his feet, but the hireling was still engulfed, and 
 Miss McRory was still on the wrong side of the 
 slit. After that I forgot them, wholly and heart- 
 lessly, as is invariable in such cases. 
 
 As a matter of fact, I had no attention to spare 
 for anyone but myself, even though we went, for 
 the first twenty minutes or so, as on rubber tyres, 
 through bland dairy farms wherein the sweet 
 influences of the dairy-cow had induced gaps in 
 every fence, and gates into every road. The 
 scent, mercifully for Daniel, was not quite what 
 it had been ; the fox had run through cattle, and 
 also through goats (a small and odorous party, 
 on whose behalf, indeed, some slight intervention 
 on my part was required), and it was here, when 
 crossing a road, that a donkey and her foal, 
 moved by some mysterious attraction akin to 
 love at first sight, attached themselves to me. 
 Undeterred by the fact that the mother's foreleg 
 was fettered to her hind, the pair sped from field 
 to field in my wake ; at the checks, which just 
 
 273 s 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 then were frequent, they brayed enthusiastically. 
 I thought to elude them at a steep drop into a 
 road, but they toboganned down it without an 
 effort; when they overtook me the fetter-chain 
 was broken, and clanked from the mother's hind- 
 leg as if she were a family ghost. 
 
 There came at length a moment, outside a 
 farm-house, when it seemed as if the fox had 
 beaten us. Here, on the farther side of Castle 
 Knox, I was well out of my own country, and 
 what the fox's point might be was represented 
 by the letter X. Nevertheless it was here that I 
 lifted the hounds and brought off the cast of a life- 
 time ; I am inclined to think that he had lain 
 down under a hayrick and was warned of our 
 approach by the voices of my attendant jackasses ; 
 my cast was probably not much more of a fluke 
 than such inspirations usually are, but the luck 
 was with me. Old Playboy, sole relic of my 
 deputy Mastership, lifted his white head and 
 endorsed my suggestion with a single bass note ; 
 Rally, Philippa's prize puppy, uttered a soprano 
 cadenza, and the pack suddenly slid away over 
 the pasture fields, with the smoothness and una- 
 nimity of the Petits Chevaux over their green 
 
 cloth. 
 
 It was now becoming for Daniel and me some- 
 thing of an effort to keep our proud and lonely 
 
 274 
 
The Comte de Pralines 
 
 place in or about the next field to the hounds. 
 The fields were coming smaller, the gaps fewer ; 
 Daniel had no intention of chucking it, but he 
 gave me to understand that he meant to take the 
 hills on the second speed. And, unfortunately, 
 the hills were coming. The hounds, by this time 
 three fences ahead, flung over a bank on the up- 
 grade, a bank that would give pause for reflection 
 at the beginning of a run. I tried back, scrambled 
 into a lane, followed it up the hill, with the cry of 
 the hounds coming fainter each minute, dragged 
 a cart wheel and a furze bush out of a gap with 
 my crop, found myself in a boggy patch of turnips, 
 surrounded by towering fuchsia hedges, and 
 realised that the pack had passed in music out of 
 sight. 
 
 I stood still and looked at my watch. It was 
 already an hour and twenty minutes from the 
 word *' Go ! " and the hounds were not only gone 
 but were still going. A man who has lost hounds 
 inevitably follows the line of least resistance. I 
 retired from the turnip field, and abandoned 
 myself to the lane, which seemed not disinclined 
 to follow the direction in which the hounds had 
 been heading. Since the hayrick episode they 
 had been running right-handed, and the lane bent 
 right-handed over the end of the hill, and pre- 
 sently deposited me on a road. It was one of 
 
 275 
 
In Mr. Knoxs Country 
 
 the moments when the greatness of the world 
 is borne in upon the wayfarer. There was a 
 spacious view from the hill-side ; three parishes, 
 at least, offered themselves for my selection, and I 
 surveyed them, solitary and remote as the even- 
 ing star, and with no more reason than it for 
 favouring one more than another. A harrowing, 
 and, by this time, but too familiar cry, broke on 
 my ear, an undulating cry as of a thing that 
 galloped as it roared. My admirers were still 
 on my trail ; I gave Daniel a touch of the spurs 
 and trotted on to the right. 
 
 No human being was visible, but some way 
 ahead there was a slated house at a cross-roads ; 
 there, at all events, I could get my bearings. 
 There were porter-barrels outside it, and from 
 some distance I heard two voices, male and female, 
 engaged in loud and ferocious argument; I had 
 no difficulty in diagnosing a public-house. When 
 Daniel and I darkened the doorway the shouting 
 ceased abruptly, and I saw a farmer, in his Sunday 
 clothes, making an unsteady retreat through a 
 door at the back of the shop. The other disput- 
 ant, a large, middle-aged woman, remained en- 
 trenched behind the counter, and regarded me 
 with a tranquil and commanding eye. She in- 
 formed me, as from a pulpit, that I was six miles 
 from Castle Knox, and with dignity, as though 
 
 276 
 
The Comte de Pralines 
 
 leaving a pulpit, she moved from behind the 
 counter, and advanced to the door to indicate my 
 road. I asked her if she had seen anything of 
 the hounds. 
 
 "There was one of your dogs looked in the 
 door to me a while ago," she replied, ** but he got 
 a couple of boxes from the cat that have kittens ; 
 I d'no what way he went. Indeed I was bothered 
 at the time with that poor man that came in 
 to thank me for the compliment I paid him in 
 going to his sister's funeral." 
 
 I said that he certainly seemed to feel it very 
 much. At which she looked hard at me and said 
 that he was on his way to a wedding, and that it 
 might be he had a drop taken to rise his heart. 
 " He was after getting a half a crown from a 
 gentleman — a huntsman like yourself," she added, 
 **that was striving to get his horse out of a 
 ditch." 
 
 ** Was there a lady with him ? " I asked. 
 
 *' There was, faith ! And the two o' them 
 legged it away then through the country, and 
 they galloping like the deer ! " 
 
 So, in all love, we parted ; before I reached the 
 next turning renewed sounds of battle told me 
 that the compliment was still being pressed home. 
 
 My road, bending ever to the right, strolled 
 through an untidy nondescript country, with little 
 
 277 
 
In Mr, Knoxs Country 
 
 bits of bog, and little lumps of hill, and little rags 
 of fields. I had jogged a mile or so when I saw 
 a hound, a few fields away to my right, poking 
 along on what appeared to be a line ; he flopped 
 into a boggy ditch, and scrambled from it on to 
 a fence. He stood there undecidedly, like any 
 human being, reviewing the situation, and then I 
 saw his head and stern go up. The next moment 
 I also heard what he had heard, a faint and far- 
 away note of the horn. It came again, a long 
 and questing call. 
 
 The road was flat and fairly straight ; far away 
 upon it something was moving gradually into my 
 scope of vision, something with specks of red in 
 it. It advanced upon me, firmly, and at a smart 
 pace ; heading it, like the ram of a battleship, 
 was Mr. Knox. With him, ** of all his halls had 
 nursed," remained only the two hounds with the 
 hairless backs, the two who, according to Miss 
 McRory, were always scratching. Behind him 
 was a small and unsmiling selection from those 
 who, like him, had lost the hunt. Lady Knox 
 headed them ; my wife and Bill brought up the 
 rear. The hound whom I had seen in the bog 
 had preceded me, and was now joining himself to 
 his two comrades, putting the best face he could 
 upon it, with a frowning brow and his hackles up. 
 The comrades, in their official position of sole 
 
 278 
 
The Comte de Pralines 
 
 representatives of the pack, received him with 
 orthodox sternness, and though unable, for obvious 
 reasons, to put their hackles up, the bald places 
 on their backs were of an intimidating pink. 
 
 My own reception followed the same lines. 
 
 ** Where are the hounds ? " barked Flurry, in the 
 awful tones of a parent addressing a governess 
 who, through gross neglect, has mislaid her 
 charges. 
 
 Before I had had time to make up my mind 
 whether to be truculent or pacific, there was a 
 shout away on our left. At some little distance 
 up a by-road, a man was standing on a furze- 
 plumed bank, beckoning to us with a driving- 
 whip. Flurry stood in his stirrups, and held up 
 his cap. The man yelled information that was 
 wholly unintelligible, but the driving-whip indi- 
 cated a point beyond him, and Flurry's brown 
 mare jumped from a standstill to a gallop, and 
 swung into the by-road. 
 
 The little band of followers swung after him. 
 When Lady Knox was well ahead, I followed, 
 and found myself battering between high banks 
 behind Philippa and Bill Cunningham. 
 
 ** Where's Mossoo ? " my wife said breathlessly, 
 as Daniel's head drew level with her sandwich 
 case. '' We met the man who pulled him out of 
 
 the ditch — up in the hills there " 
 
 279 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 ** Yes, by Jove! " said Bill, ** Flurry asked him 
 if it was a Frenchman, and the chap said, ' French 
 or German, he had curses as good as yourself!' 
 I told Flurry it must have been you ! " 
 
 " I don't mind Flurry, it's Lady Knox " 
 
 began Philippa. 
 
 Here we all came to a violent full-stop. 
 Flurry's advance had been arrested by a covered- 
 car and horse drawn across the road ; the horse 
 was eating grass, the driver, with the reins in his 
 hand, was standing with his back to us on the 
 top of the bank from which he had hailed us, 
 howling plaudits, as if he were watching a race. 
 There were distant shouts, and barking dogs, and 
 bellowing cattle, and blended with them was the 
 unmistakable baying of hounds. 
 
 I daresay that what Flurry said to the driver 
 did him good — did Flurry good, I mean. The 
 car lurched to one side, and, as we squeezed past 
 it, we saw between its black curtains a vision of 
 a scarlet-faced bride, embedded in female relatives ; 
 two outside cars, driverless, and loaded with wed- 
 ding guests, were drawn up a little farther on. 
 Flurry, still exploding like a shell, thundered on 
 down the lane ; the high bank ended at a gate- 
 way, he turned in, and as we crushed in after him 
 we were greeted by a long and piercing '* Who- 
 whoop ! " 
 
 280 
 
The Comte de Pralines 
 
 We were in a straggling field with furzy patches 
 in it. At the farther end of it was a crowd of 
 country people on horses and on foot, obviously 
 more wedding-guests ; back of all, on a road 
 below, was a white-washed chapel, and near it, 
 still on the chestnut horse, was the priest who 
 had headed the morning fox. Close to one of 
 the clumps of furze the Comte de Pralines was 
 standing, knee-deep in baying hounds, holding 
 the body of the fox high above his head, and 
 uttering scream upon scream of the most orthodox 
 quality. He flung the fox to the hounds, the 
 onlookers cheered. Miss McRory, seated on the 
 car-horse, waved the brush above her head, and 
 squealed at the top of her voice something that 
 sounded like " Yoicks ! " Her hair was floating^ 
 freely down her back ; a young countryman, in 
 such sacrificial attire as suggested the bridegroom, 
 was running across the field with her hat in his 
 hand. 
 
 Flurry pulled up in silence ; so did we. We 
 were all quite outside the picture, and we knew it. 
 
 '* Oh, the finest hunt ever you see ! " cried the 
 bridegroom as he passed us; *'it was Father Dwyer 
 seen him shnaking into the furze, the villyan ! " 
 
 ** Worry, worry, worry ! Tear him and eat 
 him, old fellows ! " shouted the Comte de Pralines. 
 ** Give the hounds room, can't you, you chaps ! I 
 
 281 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 suppose you never saw them break up a fox 
 before ! " This to the wedding guests, who had 
 crowded in, horse and foot, on top of the scuffling, 
 growHng pack. 
 
 Flurry turned an iron face upon me. His eye 
 was no bigger than a pin's head. 
 
 " I suppose it's from Larkie McRory he got 
 the English ? " he said ; '' he learnt it quick." 
 
 **The McRorys don't speak English!" said 
 Lady Knox, in a voice like a north-east wind. 
 
 '' Seulement tres petit f" Philippa murmured 
 brazenly. 
 
 Whether Lady Knox heard her or not, I am 
 unable to say. Her face was averted from me, 
 and remained as inflexible as a profile on a coin 
 — a Roman coin, for choice. 
 
 The faculty of not knowing when you are 
 beaten is one that has, I think, been lauded beyond 
 its deserving. Napoleon the Great has con- 
 demned manoeuvring before a fixed position, and 
 Lady Knox was clearly a fixed position. Accept- 
 ing these tenets, I began an unostentatious retire- 
 ment, in which I was joined by Philippa. We 
 were nearing safety and the gate of the field, 
 when a yearning, choking wail came to us from 
 the lane. 
 
 *• The Bride ? " queried my wife hysterically. 
 
 It was repeated ; in the same instant my 
 282 
 
The Comte de Pralines 
 
 admirers, the jackasses, mere et fils, advanced 
 upon the scene at a delirious gallop, and, sobbing 
 with the ecstasy of reunion, resumed their attend- 
 ance upon Daniel. 
 
 For a moment the attention of the field, in- 
 cluding even that of the Roman coin, was diverted 
 from the Comte de Pralines, and was concentrated 
 upon our retreat. 
 
 283 
 
XI 
 
 THE SHOOTING OF SHINROE 
 
 Mr. Joseph Francis M'Cabe rose stiffly from 
 his basket chair, picked up the cushion on which 
 he had been seated, looked at it with animosity, hit 
 it hard with his fist, and, flinging it into the chair, 
 replaced himself upon it, with the single word : 
 
 ^^Flog!" 
 
 I was aware that he referred to the flock with 
 which the cushions in the lounge of Reardon's 
 Hotel were stuffed. 
 
 <* They have this hotel destroyed altogether 
 with their improvements," went on Mr. M'Cabe 
 between puffs, as he lit his pipe. ** God be with 
 the time this was the old smoking-room, before 
 they knocked it and the hall into one and spoilt 
 the two of them ! There were fine solid chairs 
 in it that time, that you'd sleep in as good as 
 your bed, but as for these wicker affairs, I declare 
 the wind 'd whistle through them the same as a 
 crow's nest." He paused, and brought his heel 
 down heavily on the top of the fire. ** And look 
 at that for a grate ! A Well-grate they call it, — 
 rd ssiy, 'Leave Well alone!* Thirty years I'm 
 
 284 
 
The Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 coming to Sessions here, and putting up in this 
 house, and in place of old Tim telling me me own 
 room was ready for me, there's a whipper-snapper 
 of a snapdragon in a glass box in the hall, asking 
 me me name in broken English " (it may be men- 
 tioned that this happened before the War), " and 
 
 * Had I a Cook's ticket ? ' and down-facing me 
 that I must leave my key in what he called the 
 
 * Bew-ro.' " 
 
 I said I knew of a lady who always took a 
 Cook's ticket when she went abroad, because 
 when she got to Paris there would be an English- 
 man on the platform to meet her, or at all events 
 a broken Englishman. 
 
 Mr. M^Cabe softened to a temporary smile, 
 but held on to his grievance with the tenacity of 
 his profession. (I don't think I have mentioned 
 that he is a Solicitor, of a type now, unfortunately, 
 becoming obsolete.) He had a long grey face, 
 and a short grey moustache ; he dyed his hair, 
 and his age was known to no man. 
 
 ** There was one of Cook's tourists sat next 
 me at breakfast," he resumed, *'and he asked me 
 was I ever in Ireland before, and how long was I 
 in it. * Wan day,' says I ! " 
 
 *' Did he believe you ? " I asked. 
 
 ** He did," replied Mr. M'Cabe, with something 
 that approached compassion. 
 
 285 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 I have always found old M'Cabe a mitigating 
 circumstance of Sessions at Owenford, both in 
 Court and out of it. He was a sportsman of the 
 ingrained variety that grows wild in Ireland, and 
 in any of the horse-coping cases that occasionally 
 refresh the innermost soul of Munster, it would be 
 safe to assume that Mr. M'Cabe's special gifts had 
 ensured his being retained, generally on the shady 
 side. He fished when occasion served, he shot 
 whether it did or not. He did not exactly keep 
 horses, but he always knew some one who was 
 prepared to ** pass on " a thoroughly useful 
 animal, with some infirmity so insignificant that 
 until you tried to dispose of him you did not 
 realise that he was yours, until his final passing- 
 on to the next world. He had certain shooting 
 privileges in the mountains behind the town of 
 Owenford (bestowed, so he said, by a grateful 
 client), and it had often been suggested by him 
 that he and I should anticipate some November 
 Sessions by a day, and spend it ** on the hill." We 
 were now in the act of carrying out the project. 
 
 *' Ah, these English," M'Cabe began again, 
 mixing himself a glass of whisky and water, 
 *' they'd believe anything so long as it wasn't the 
 truth. Talking politics these lads were, and by 
 the time they had their ham and eggs swallowed 
 they had the whole country arranged. * And 
 
 286 
 
The Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 look,* says they — they were anglers, God help 
 us ! — * look at all the money that's going to 
 waste for want of preserving the rivers ! ' * I 
 beg your pardon,' says I, * there's water-bailiffs 
 on the most of the rivers. I was defending a 
 man not long since, that was cot by the water- 
 bailiff poaching salmon on the Owen. * And 
 what proof have you } ' says I to the water-bailiff. 
 * How do you know it was a salmon at all ? ' * Is 
 it how would I know ? ' says the bailiff, * didn't I 
 gaff the fish for him meself ! ' " 
 
 ** What did your anglers say to that .^^ " I 
 enquired. 
 
 ** Well, they didn't quite go so far as to tell me 
 I was a liar," said Mr. M'Cabe tranquilly. "Ah, 
 telling such as them the truth is wasting what 
 isn't plenty ! Then they'll meet some fellow that 
 lies like a tooth-drawer, and they'll write to the 
 English Times on the head of him ! " He 
 stretched forth a long and bony hand for the 
 tumbler of whisky and water. ** And talking of 
 tooth-drawers," he went on, ** there's a dentist 
 comes here once a fortnight, Jeffers his name is, 
 and a great sportsman too. I was with him to- 
 day " — he passed his hand consciously over his 
 mouth, and the difference that I had dimly felt 
 in his appearance suddenly, and in all senses of 
 the word, flashed upon me — "and he was telling 
 
 287 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 me how one time, in the summer that's past, he'd 
 been out all night, fishing in the Owen. He was 
 going home before the dawn, and he jumped 
 down off a bank on to what he took to be a white 
 stone — and he aimed for the stone, mind you, 
 because he thought the ground was wet — and 
 what was it but a man's face ! " M^Cabe paused 
 to receive my comment. "What did he do, is 
 it ? Ran off for his life, roaring out, * There's a 
 first-rate dentist in Owenford ! ' The fellow was 
 lying asleep there, and he having bundles of 
 spurge with him to poison the river! He had 
 taken drink, I suppose." 
 
 ** Was he a water-bailiff too ? " said I. "I hope 
 the conservators of the river stood him a set of 
 teeth." 
 
 ** If they did," said M'Cabe, with an unexpected 
 burst of feeling, '* I pity him ! " He rose to his 
 feet, and put his tumbler down on the chimney- 
 piece. " Well, we should get away early in the 
 morning, and it's no harm for me to go to bed." 
 
 He yawned — a large yawn that ended abruptly 
 with a metallic click. His eyes met mine, full of 
 unspoken things ; we parted in a silence that 
 seemed to have been artificially imposed upon 
 Mr. M'Cabe. 
 
 The wind boomed intermittently in my chimney 
 during the night, and a far and heavy growling 
 
 288 
 
I'he Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 told of the dissatisfaction of the sea. Yet the 
 morning was not unfavourable. There was a 
 broken mist, with shimmers of sun in it, and the 
 carman said it would be a thing of nothing, and 
 would go out with the tide. The Boots, a relic 
 of the old regime, was pessimistic, and mentioned 
 that there were two stars squez up agin the moon 
 last night, and he would have no dependence on 
 the day. M'Cabe offered no opinion, being occu- 
 pied in bestowing in a species of dog-box beneath 
 the well of the car a young red setter, kindly lent 
 by his friend the dentist. The setter, who had 
 formed at sight an unfavourable opinion of the 
 dog-box, had resolved himself into an inverte- 
 brate mass of jelly and lead, and was with 
 difficulty straightened out and rammed home 
 into it. 
 
 **Have we all now?" said M'Cabe, slamming 
 the door in the dog's face. " Take care we're not 
 like me uncle, old Tom Duffy, that was going 
 shooting, and was the whole morning slapping his 
 pockets and saying, * Me powder ! me shot ! me 
 caps ! me wads ! ' and when he got to the bog, 
 * O tare an' ouns ! ' says he, * I forgot the gun ! ' " 
 
 There are still moments when I can find some 
 special and not-otherwise-to-be-attained flavour 
 in driving on an outside car ; a sense of personal 
 achievement in sitting, by some method of in- 
 
 289 T 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 stinctive suction, the lurches and swoops peculiar 
 to these vehicles. Reardon's had given us its 
 roomiest car and its best horse, a yellow mare, 
 with a long back and a slinging trot, and a mouth 
 of iron. 
 
 " Where did Mr. Reardon get the mare, 
 Jerry?" asked M'Cabe, as we zigzagged in 
 successive hairbreadths through the streets of 
 Owenford. 
 
 " D-Dublin, sir," replied the driver, who, with 
 both fists extended in front of him and both heels 
 planted against his narrow footboard, seemed to 
 find utterance difficult. 
 
 ** She's a goer ! " said M'Cabe. 
 
 '* She is — she killed two men," said Jerry, in 
 two jerks. 
 
 ** That's a great credit to her. What way did 
 she do it ? " 
 
 ** P-pulled the lungs out o' them ! " ejaculated 
 Jerry, turning the last corner and giving the mare 
 a shade more of her head, as a tribute, perhaps, 
 to her prowess. 
 
 She swung us for some six miles along the ruts 
 of the coast road at the same unflinching pace, 
 after which, turning inland and uphill, we began 
 the climb of four miles into the mountains. It 
 was about eleven o'clock when we pulled up 
 beside a long and reedy pool, high up in the 
 
 290 
 
T!he Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 heather ; the road went on, illimitably it seemed, 
 and was lost, with its attendant telegraph posts, 
 in cloud. 
 
 "Away with ye now, Jerry," said M^Cabe ; 
 ** we'll shoot our way home." 
 
 He opened the back of the dog-box, and sum- 
 moned its occupant. The summons was dis- 
 regarded. Far back in the box two sparks of 
 light and a dead silence indicated the presence 
 of the dog. 
 
 "How. snug you are in there!" said M'Cabe ; 
 "here, Jerry, pull him out for us. What the 
 deuce is this his name is ? Jeffers told me yester- 
 day, and it's gone from me." 
 
 "I d'no would he bite me?" said Jerry, taking 
 a cautious observation and giving voice to the 
 feelings of the party. " Here, poor fellow ! Here, 
 good lad ! " 
 
 The good lad remained immovable. The lure 
 of a sandwich produced no better result. 
 
 " We can't be losing our day with the brute 
 this way," said M'Cabe. " Tip up the car. He'll 
 come out then, and no thanks to him." 
 
 As the shafts rose heavenwards, the law of 
 gravitation proved too many for the setter, and 
 he slowly slid to earth. 
 
 " If I only knew your dam name we'd be all 
 right now," said M'Cabe. 
 
 291 
 
In Mr. Knoxs Country 
 
 The carman dropped the shafts on to the mare, 
 and drove on up the pass, with one side of the 
 car turned up and himself on the other. The 
 yellow mare had, it seemed, only begun her day's 
 work. A prophetic instinct, of the reliable kind 
 that is strictly founded on fact, warned me that we 
 might live to regret her departure. 
 
 The dentist's setter had, at sight of the guns, 
 realised that things were better than he had ex- 
 pected, and now preceded us along the edge of 
 the lake with every appearance of enthusiasm. 
 He quartered the ground with professional zeal, 
 he splashed through the sedge, and rattled 
 through thickets of dry reeds, and set succes- 
 sively a heron, a water-hen, and something, un- 
 seen, that I believe to have been a water-rat. 
 After each of these efforts he rushed in upon his 
 quarry, and we called him by all the gun-dog 
 names we had ever heard of, from Don to 
 Grouse, from Carlo to Shot, coupled with ob- 
 jurgations on a rising scale. With none of them 
 did we so much as vibrate a chord in his bosom. 
 He was a large dog, with a blunt stupid face, 
 and a faculty for excitement about nothing that 
 impelled him to bound back to us as often ^ as 
 possible, to gaze in our eyes in brilliant enquiry, 
 and to pant and prance before us with all the 
 fatuity of youth. Had he been able to speak, 
 
 292 
 
The Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 he would have asked idiotic questions, of that 
 special breed that exact from their victim a 
 reply of equal imbecility. 
 
 The lake and its environs, for the first time 
 in M'Cabe's experience, yielded nothing ; we 
 struck up on to the mountain side, follow- 
 ing the course of an angry stream that came 
 racing down from the heights. We worked up 
 through ling and furze, and skirted flocks of pale 
 stones that lay in the heather like petrified sheep, 
 and the dog, ranging deliriously, set water-wag- 
 tails and anything else that could fiy ; I believe 
 he would have set a blue-bottle, and I said so to 
 M'Cabe. 
 
 " Ah, give him time ; he'll settle down," said 
 M'Cabe, who had a thankfulness for small 
 mercies born of a vast experience of makeshifts ; 
 **he might fill the bag for us yet." 
 
 We laboured along the flank of the mountain, 
 climbing in and out of small ravines, jumping or 
 wading streams, sloshing through yellow sedgery 
 bog ; always with the brown heather running up 
 to the misty skyline, and always with the same 
 atrocious luck. Once a small pack of grouse got 
 up, very wild, and leagues out of range, thanks 
 to the far-reaching activities of the dog, and 
 once a hermit woodcock exploded out of a clump 
 of furze, and sailed away down the slope, followed 
 
 293 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 by four charges of shot and the red setter, in 
 equally innocuous pursuit. And this, up to 
 luncheon time, was the sum of the morning's 
 sport. 
 
 We ate our sandwiches on a high ridge, under 
 the lee of a tumbled pile of boulders, that looked 
 as if they had been about to hurl themselves into 
 the valley, and had thought better of it at the 
 last moment. Between the looming, elephant- 
 grey mountains the mist yielded glimpses of the 
 far greenness of the sea, the only green thing 
 in sight in this world of grey and brown. The 
 dog sat opposite to me, and willed me to share 
 my food with him. His steady eyes were 
 charged with the implication that I was a glut- 
 ton ; personally I abhorred him, yet I found it 
 impossible to give him less than twenty-five 
 per cent, of my sandwiches. 
 
 " I wonder did Jeffers take him for a bad 
 debt," said M'Cabe reflectively, as he lit his pipe. 
 
 I said I should rather take my chance with 
 the bad debt. 
 
 ** He might have treated me better," M'Cabe 
 grumbled on, ''seeing that I paid him seven 
 pound ten the day before yesterday, let alone 
 that it was me that was the first to put him up 
 to this — this bit of Shinroe Mountain that never 
 was what you might call strictly preserved. 
 
 294 
 
Hhe Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 When he came here first he didn't as much as 
 know what cartridges he'd want for it. * Six and 
 eight,' says I, 'that's a lawyer's fee, so if you 
 think of me you 11 not forget it ! ' And now, if 
 ye please," went on Mr. Jeffers' preceptor in 
 sport, ** he's shooting the whole country and 
 selling all he gets ! And he wouldn't as much as 
 ask me to go with him ; and the excuse he gives, 
 he wouldn't like to have an old hand like me 
 connyshooring his shots ! How modest he is ! ' 
 
 I taunted M'Cabe with having been weak 
 enough thus to cede his rights, and M'Cabe, who 
 was not at all amused, said that after all it wasn't 
 so much Jeffers that did the harm, but an infernal 
 English Syndicate that had taken the Shinroe 
 shooting this season, and paid old Purcell that 
 owned it ten times what it was worth. 
 
 "It might be as good for us to get off their 
 ground now," continued M'Cabe, rising slowly 
 to his feet, ** and try the Lackagreina Valley. The 
 stream below is their bounds." 
 
 This, I hasten to say, was the first I had 
 heard of the Syndicate, and I thought it tactless 
 of M'Cabe to have mentioned it, even though 
 the wrong that we had done them was purely 
 technical. I said to him that I thought the sooner 
 we got off their ground the better, and we de- 
 scended the hill and crossed the stream, and 
 
 295 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 M*Cabe said that he could always shoot this 
 next stretch of country when he liked. With 
 this assurance, we turned our backs on the sea 
 and struck inland, tramping for an hour or more 
 through country whose entire barrenness could 
 only be explained on the hypothesis that it has 
 been turned inside out to dry. So far it had 
 failed to achieve even this result. 
 
 The weather got thicker, and the sport, if 
 possible, thinner; I had long since lost what 
 bearings I possessed, but M'Cabe said he knew 
 of a nice patch of scrub in the next valley that 
 always held a cock. The next valley came at 
 last, not without considerable effort, but no patch 
 of scrub was apparent. Some small black and 
 grey cattle stood and looked at us, and a young 
 bull showed an inclination to stalk the dog; it 
 seemed the only sport the valley was likely to 
 afford. M'Cabe looked round him, and looked 
 at his watch, and looked at the sky, which did 
 not seem to be more than a yard above our 
 heads, and said without emotion : 
 
 ** Did ye think of telling the lad in the glass 
 box in the hall that we might want some dinner 
 kept hot for us ? I d'no from Adam where we've 
 got to ! '* 
 
 There was a cattle track along the side of the 
 valley which might, though not necessarily, lead 
 
 296 
 
The Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 somewhere. We pursued it, and found that it 
 led, in the first instance, to some blackfaced 
 mountain sheep. A cheerful interlude followed, 
 in which the red setter hunted the sheep, and we 
 hunted the setter, and what M'Cabe said about 
 the dentist in the intervals of the chase was 
 more appropriate to the occasion than to these 
 pages. 
 
 When justice had been satiated, and the last 
 echo of the last yell of the dog had trembled into 
 silence among the hills, we resumed the cattle- 
 track, which had become a shade more reliable, 
 and, as we proceeded, began to give an im- 
 pression that it might lead somewhere. The day 
 was dying in threatening stillness. Lethargic 
 layers of mist bulged low, like the roof of a 
 marquee, and cloaked every outline that could 
 yield us information. The dog, unchastened 
 by recent events, and full of an idiot optimism, 
 continued to range the hillside. 
 
 ** I suppose ril never get the chance to tell 
 Jeffers my opinion of that tom-fool," said M'Cabe, 
 following with an eye of steel the perambula- 
 tions of the dog ; " the best barrister that ever 
 wore a wig couldn't argue with a dentist! He 
 has his fist half way down your throat before you 
 can open your mouth ; and in any case he'll tell 
 me we couldn't expect any dog would work for 
 
 29; 
 
In Mr. Knoxs Country 
 
 us when we forgot his name. What's the brute 
 at now ? " 
 
 The brute was high above us on the hillside, 
 setting a solitary furze bush with convincing de- 
 termination, and casting backward looks to see 
 if he were being supported. 
 
 "It might be a hare," said M'Cabe, cocking 
 his gun, with a revival of hope that was almost 
 pathetic, and ascending towards the furze bush. 
 
 I neither quickened my pace nor deviated from 
 the cattle track, but I may admit that I did so 
 far yield to the theory of the hare as to slip a 
 cartridge into my gun. 
 
 M'Cabe put his gun to his shoulder, lowered 
 it abrupdy, and walked up to the furze bush. He 
 stooped and picked up something. 
 
 ** He's not such a fool after all ! " he called out ; 
 " ye said he'd set a blue-bottle, and b' Jove ye 
 weren't far out ! " 
 
 He held up a black object that was neither bird 
 nor beast. 
 
 I took the cartridge out of my gun as unob- 
 trusively as possible, and M*Cabe and the dog 
 rejoined me with the product of the day's sport. 
 It was a flat-sided bottle, high shouldered, with a 
 short neck ; M'Cabe extracted the cork and took 
 a sniff. 
 
 '•Mountain dew no less!" (Mr. M'Cabe ad- 
 298 
 
The Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 hered faithfully to the stock phrases of his youth.) 
 ** This never paid the King a shilling ! Give me 
 the cup off your flask, Major, till we see what 
 sort it is." 
 
 It was pretty rank, and even that seasoned 
 vessel, old M'Cabe, admitted that it might be 
 drinkable in another couple of years, but hardly 
 in less ; yet as it ran, a rivulet of fire, through 
 my system, it seemed to me that even the water 
 in my boots became less chill. 
 
 ** In the public interest v/e're bound to remove 
 it," said IVrCabe, putting the bottle into his game 
 bag ; *' any man that drank enough of that 'd rob 
 a church ! Well, anyway, we're not the only 
 people travelling this path," he continued; ** who- 
 ever put his afternoon tea to hide there will 
 choose a less fashionable promenade next time. 
 But indeed the poor man couldn't be blamed for 
 not knowing such a universal genius of a dog 
 was coming this way ! Didn't I tell you he'd fill 
 the bag for us ! " 
 
 He extracted from his pockets a pair of knitted 
 gloves, and put them on ; it was equivalent to 
 putting up the shutters. 
 
 It was shortly after this that we regained touch 
 with civilisation. Above the profile of a hill a 
 telegraph post suddenly showed itself against the 
 grey of the misty twilight. We made as bee-like 
 
 299 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 a line for it as the nature of the ground permitted, 
 and found ourselves on a narrow road, at a point 
 where it was in the act of making a hairpin turn 
 before plunging into a valley. 
 
 " The Beacon Bay road, begad ! " said M'Cabe ; 
 " I didn't think we were so far out of our way. 
 Let me see now, which way is this we'd best go." 
 
 He stood still and looked round him, taking 
 his bearings ; in the solitude the telegraph posts 
 hummed to each other, full of information and 
 entirely reticent. 
 
 The position was worse than I thought. By 
 descending into the valley we should, a couple or 
 three miles farther on, strike the coast road about 
 six miles from home ; by ascending the hill and 
 walking four miles, we should arrive at the station 
 of Coppeen Road, and, with luck, there intercept 
 the evening train for Owenford. 
 
 *' And that's the best of our play, but we'll have 
 to step out," concluded M'Cabe, shortening the 
 strap of his game-bag, and settling it on his back. 
 
 " If I were you," I said, "I'd chuck that stuff 
 away. Apart from anything else, it's about half 
 a ton extra to carry." 
 
 *' There's many a thing, Major, that you might 
 do that I might not do," returned M'Cabe with 
 solemnity, *' and in the contrairy sense the state- 
 ment is equally valid." 
 
 300 
 
"the Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 He faced the hill with humped shoulders, and 
 fell with no more words into his poacher's stride, 
 and I followed him with the best imitation of it 
 that I could put up after at least six hours of 
 heavy going. M'Cabe is fifteen years older than 
 I am, and \ hope that when I am his age I shall 
 have more consideration than he for those who 
 are younger than myself. 
 
 It was now nearly half-past five o'clock, and 
 by the time we had covered a mile of puddles 
 and broken stones it was too dark to see which 
 was which. I felt considerable dubiety about 
 catching the train at Coppeen Road, all the more 
 that it was a flag station, demanding an extra five 
 minutes in hand. Probably the engine-driver 
 had long since abandoned any expectation of 
 passengers at Coppeen Road, and, if he even 
 noticed the signal, would treat it as a practical 
 joke. It was after another quarter of an hour's 
 trudge that a distant sound entered into the 
 silence that had fallen upon M'Cabe and me, an 
 intermittent grating of wheels upon patches of 
 broken stone, a steady hammer of hoofs. 
 M'Cabe halted. 
 
 ♦'That car's bound to be going to Owenford," 
 he said ; ** I wonder could they give us a lift." 
 
 A single light (the economical habit of the South 
 of Ireland) began to split the foggy darkness. 
 
 301 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 ** Begad, that's like the go of Reardon's mare ! " 
 said M'Cabe, as the light swung down upon us. 
 
 We held the road like highwaymen, we called 
 upon the unseen driver to stop, and he answered 
 to the name of Jerry. This is not a proof of 
 identity in a province where every third man is 
 dignified by the name of Jeremiah, but as the car 
 pulled up it was Reardon's yellow mare on which 
 the lamplight fell, and we knew that the fates had 
 relented. 
 
 We should certainly not catch the train at 
 Coppeen Road, Jerry assured us; "she had," 
 he said, ** a fashion of running early on Monday 
 nights, and in any case if you'd want to catch 
 that thrain, you should make like an amber-bush 
 for her." 
 
 We agreed that it was too late for the pre- 
 paration of an ambush. 
 
 *' If the Sergeant had no objections," continued 
 Jerry, progressing smoothly towards the tip that 
 would finally be his, ** it would be no trouble at 
 all to oblige the gentlemen. Sure it's the big car 
 I have, and it's often I took six, yes, and seven 
 on it, going to the races." 
 
 I was now aware of two helmeted presences 
 on the car, and a decorous voice said that the 
 gentlemen were welcome to a side of the car if 
 they liked. 
 
 302 
 
l^he Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 ** Is that Sergeant Leonard?" asked M'Cabe, 
 who knew every policeman in the country. 
 **Well, Sergeant, you've a knack of being on 
 the spot when you're wanted ! " 
 
 ** And sometimes when he's not ! " said I. 
 
 There was a third and unhelmeted presence on 
 the car, and something of stillness and aloofness 
 in it had led me to diagnose a prisoner. 
 
 The suggested dispositions were accomplished. 
 The two policemen and the prisoner wedged 
 themselves on one side of the car, M'Cabe and 
 I mounted the other, and put the dog on the 
 cushion of the well behind us (his late quarters 
 in the dog-box being occupied by half a mountain 
 sheep, destined for the hotel larder). The 
 yellow mare went gallantly up to her collar, 
 regardless of her augmented load ; M'Cabe and 
 the Sergeant leaned to each other across the 
 back of the car, and fell into profound and low- 
 toned converse ; I smoked, and the dog, propping 
 his wet back against mine, made friends with the 
 prisoner. It may be the Irish blood in me that 
 is responsible for the illicit sympathy with a 
 prisoner that sometimes incommodes me ; I cer- 
 tainly bestowed some of it upon the captive, 
 sandwiched between two stalwarts of the R.I.C., 
 and learning that the strong arm of the Law was 
 a trifle compared with the rest of its person. 
 
 303 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 " What sport had you, Major ? " enquired Jerry, 
 as we slackened speed at a hill. 
 
 I was sitting at the top of the car, under his 
 elbow, and he probably thought that I was feeling 
 neglected during the heart-to-heart confidences 
 of M'Cabe and the Sergeant 
 
 ** Not a feather," I replied. 
 
 " Sure the birds couldn't be in it this weather," 
 said Jerry considerately ; he had in his time 
 condoled with many sportsmen. ** I'm after talk- 
 ing to a man in Coppeen Road station, that was 
 carrying the game bag for them gentlemen that 
 has Mr. Purcell's shooting on Shinroe Mountain, 
 and what had the four o' them after the day — 
 only one jack-snipe ! " 
 
 **They went one better than we did," I said, 
 but, as was intended, I felt cheered — " what day 
 were they there ? " 
 
 " To-day, sure ! " answered Jerry, with faint 
 surprise, ** and they hadn't their luncheon hardly 
 ate when they met one on the mountain that told 
 them he seen two fellas walking it, with guns 
 and a dog, no more than an hour before them. 
 * That'll do ! ' says they, and they turned about 
 and back with them to Coppeen Road to tell the 
 police." 
 
 " Did they see the fellows ? " I asked lightly, 
 after a panic-stricken pause. 
 
 304 
 
The Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 "They did not. Sure they said if they seen 
 them, they'd shoot them like rooks," repHed Jerry, 
 **and they would too. It's what the man was 
 saying if they cot them lads to-day they'd have 
 left them in the way they'd be given up by both 
 doctor and priest ! Oh, they're fierce altogether ! " 
 
 I received this information in a silence that 
 was filled to bursting with the desire to strangle 
 M'Cabe. 
 
 Jerry leaned over my shoulder, and lowered his 
 voice. 
 
 **They were saying in Coppeen Road that 
 there was a gentleman that came on a mothor- 
 bike this morning early, and he had Shinroe 
 shot out by ten o'clock, and on with him then up 
 the country ; and it isn't the first time he was in 
 it. It's a pity those gentlemen couldn't ketch 
 him f Theyd mothor-bike him ! " 
 
 It was apparent that the poaching of the motor- 
 bicycle upon the legitimate preserves of carmen 
 was responsible for this remarkable sympathy with 
 the law; I, at all events, had it to my credit that 
 I had not gone poaching on a motor-bicycle. 
 
 Just here M'Cabe emerged from the heart-to- 
 heart, and nudged me in the ribs with a confede- 
 rate elbow. I did not respond, being in no mood 
 for confederacy, certainly not with M'Cabe. 
 
 " The Sergeant is after telling me this prisoner 
 30s U 
 
In Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 he has here is prosecuted at the instance of that 
 Syndicate I was telling you about," he whispered 
 hoarsely in my ear, " for hunting Shinroe with 
 greyhounds. He was cited to appear last week, 
 and he didn't turn up ; he'll be before you to- 
 morrow. I hope the Bench will have a fellow- 
 feeling for a fellow-creature ! " 
 
 The whisper ended in the wheezy cough that 
 was Mr. M'Cabe's equivalent for a laugh. It was 
 very close to my ear, and it had somewhere in 
 it the metallic click that I had noticed before. 
 
 I grunted forbiddingly, and turned my back 
 upon M'Cabe, as far as it is possible to do so on 
 an outside car, and we hammered on through the 
 darkness. Once the solitary lamp illumined the 
 prolonged countenance of a donkey, and once or 
 twice we came upon a party of sheep lying on 
 the road; they melted into the night at the 
 minatory whistle that is dedicated to sheep, and 
 on each of these occasions tne dentist's dog was 
 shaken by strong shudders, and made a con- 
 vulsive attempt to spring from the car in pursuit. 
 We were making good travelling on a long 
 down-grade, a smell of sea-weed was in the mist, 
 and a salt taste was on my lips. It was very 
 cold ; I had no overcoat, my boots had plumbed 
 the depths of many bogholes, and I found my- 
 self shivering like the dog. 
 
 306 
 
l^he Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 It was at this point that I felt M'Cabe fumbling 
 at his game-bag, that lay between us on the seat. 
 By dint of a sympathy that I would have died 
 rather than betray, I divined that he was going to 
 tap that fount of contraband fire that he owed to 
 the dentist's dog. It was, apparently, a matter 
 of some difficulty ; I felt him groping and tug- 
 ging at the straps. 
 
 I said to myself, waveringly : ** Old black- 
 guard ! I won't touch it if he offers it to me." 
 
 M^Cabe went on fumbling : 
 
 ** Damn these woolly gloves ! I can't do a 
 hand's turn with them." 
 
 In the dark I could not see what followed, but 
 I felt him raise his arm. There was a jerk, fol- 
 lowed by a howl. 
 
 "Hold on!" roared M'Cabe, with a new and 
 strange utterance, ** Thtop the horth ! I've 
 dropped me teeth ! " 
 
 The driver did his best, but with the push of 
 the hill behind her the mare took some stopping. 
 
 *'Oh, murder! oh, murder!" wailed M'Cabe, 
 lisping thickly, ** I pulled them out o* me head 
 with the glove, trying to get it off ! " He scrambled 
 off the car. ** Give me the lamp ! Me lovely new 
 teeth " 
 
 I detached the lamp from its socket with all 
 speed, and handed it to M'Cabe, who hurried 
 
 307 
 
//; Mr. Knox^s Country 
 
 back on our tracks. From motives of delicacy I 
 remained on the car, as did also the rest of the 
 party. A minute or two passed in awed silence, 
 while the patch of light went to and fro on 
 the dark road. It seemed an intrusion to offer 
 assistance, and an uncertainty as to whether to 
 allude to the loss as ** them," or ** it," made en- 
 quiries a difficulty. 
 
 *' For goodneth'ake have none o' ye any 
 matcheth, that ye couldn't come and help me ? " 
 demanded the voice of M'Cabe, in indignation 
 blurred pathetically by his gosling-like lisp. 
 
 I went to his assistance, and refrained with 
 an effort from suggesting the employment of 
 that all-accomplished setter, the dentist's dog, in 
 the search ; it was not the moment for pleasantry. 
 Not yet. 
 
 We crept along, bent double, like gorillas ; the 
 long strips of broken stones yielded nothing, the 
 long puddles between them were examined in vain. 
 
 *' What the dooth will I do to-morrow ? " raged 
 M'Cabe, pawing in the heather at the road's edge. 
 " How can I plead when I haven't a blathted 
 tooth in me head ? " 
 
 " I'll give you half a crown this minute, 
 M'Cabe," said I brutally, "if you'll say 
 * Sessions ' ! " 
 
 Here the Sergeant joined us, striking matches 
 308 
 
Hhe Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 as he came. He worked his way into the sphere 
 of the car-lamp, he was most painstaking and 
 sympathetic, and his oblique allusions to the 
 object of the search were a miracle of tact. 
 
 ** I see something white beyond you, Mr. 
 M'Cabe,'" he said respectfully, ** might that be 
 them?" 
 
 M'Cabe swung the lamp as indicated. 
 
 " No, it might not. It's a pebble," he replied, 
 with pardonable irascibility. 
 
 Silence followed, and we worked our way up 
 the hill. 
 
 "What's that, sir?" ventured the Sergeant, 
 with some excitement, stopping again and point- 
 ing. ** I think I see the gleam of the gold ! " 
 
 **Ah, nonthenth, man! They're vulcanite!" 
 snapped M'Cabe, more irascibly than ever. 
 
 The word nonsense was a disastrous effort, 
 and I withdrew into the darkness to enjoy it. 
 
 ** What colour might vulcanite be, sir ? " mur- 
 mured a voice beside me. 
 
 Jerry had joined the search-party ; he lighted, 
 as he spoke, an inch of candle. On hearing my 
 explanation he remarked that it was a bad chance, 
 and at the same instant the inch of candle slipped 
 from his fingers and fell into a puddle. 
 
 ** Divil mend ye for a candle ! Have ye a 
 match, sir ? I haven't a one left ! " 
 
 309 
 
/;; Mr, Knox's Country 
 
 As it happened, I had no matches, my only 
 means of making a light being a patent tinder- 
 box. 
 
 ** Have you a match there?" I called out to 
 the invisible occupants of the car, which was 
 about fifteen or twenty yards away, advancing 
 towards it as I spoke. The constable politely 
 jumped off and came to meet me. 
 
 As he was in the act of handing me his match- 
 box, the car drove away down the hill. 
 
 I state the fact with the bald simplicity that 
 is appropriate to great disaster. To be exact, 
 the yellow mare sprang from inaction into a 
 gallop, as if she had been stung by a wasp, and 
 had a start of at least fifty yards before either 
 the carman or the constable could get under 
 weigh. The carman, uttering shrill and menac- 
 ing whistles, led the chase, the constable, though 
 badly hampered by his greatcoat, was a good 
 second, and the Sergeant, making the best of 
 a bad start, followed them into the night. 
 
 The yellow mare's head was for home, and 
 her load was on its own legs on the road behind 
 her ; hysterical yelps from the dentist's dog in- 
 dicated that he also was on his own legs, and 
 was, in all human probability, jumping at the 
 mare's nose. As the rapturous beat of her hoofs 
 died away on the down-grade, I recalled the 
 
 310 
 
The Shooting of Shinroe 
 
 assertion that she had pulled the lungs out of 
 two men, and it seemed to me that the prisoner 
 had caught the psychological moment on the hop. 
 
 "They'll not ketch him," said M'Cabe, with 
 the flat calm of a broken man, " not to-night 
 anyway. Nor for a week maybe. He'll take 
 to the mountains." 
 
 The silence of the hills closed in upon us, and 
 we were left in our original position, plus the 
 lamp of the car, and minus our guns, the dentist's 
 dog, and M'Cabe's teeth. 
 
 Far, far away, from the direction of Coppeen 
 Road, that sinister outpost, where evil rumours 
 were launched, and the night trains were waylaid 
 by the amber-bushes, a steady tapping sound 
 advanced towards us. Over the crest of the hill, 
 a quarter of a mile away, a blazing and many- 
 pointed star sprang into being, and bore down 
 upon us. ** A motor-bike!" ejaculated M'Cabe. 
 **Take the light and thtop him — he wouldn't 
 know what I wath thaying — if he ran over them 
 they're done for ! For the love o' Merthy tell 
 him to keep the left thide of the road ! " 
 
 I took the lamp, and ran towards the bicyclist, 
 waving it as I ran. The star, now a moon of 
 acetylene ferocity, slackened speed, and a voice 
 behind it said : 
 
 *• What's up ? " 
 
 311 
 
In Mr. Knox's Country 
 
 I stated the case with telegraphic brevity, and 
 the motor-bicycle slid slowly past me. Its rider 
 had a gun slung across his back, my lamp re- 
 vealed a crammed game-bag on the carrier behind 
 him. 
 
 ** Sorry I can't assist you," he called back to 
 me, keeping carefully at the left-hand side of 
 the road, ** but I have an appoiatment." Then, 
 as an afterthought, '* There's a first-rate dentist 
 in Owenford ! " 
 
 The red eye of the tail light glowed a farewell 
 and passed on, like all the rest, into the night. 
 
 I rejoined M'Cabe. 
 
 He clutched my arm, and shook it. 
 
 ^' That wath Jefferth ! Jefferth, I tell ye ! The 
 dirty poacher I And hith bag full of our birdth ! " 
 
 It was not till the lamp went out, which it did 
 some ten minutes afterwards, that I drew M 'Cabe 
 from the scene of his loss, gently, as one deals 
 with the bereaved, and faced with him the six- 
 mile walk to Owenford. 
 
 PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY BALLANTYNE, HANSON Ss* CO. LTD. 
 EDINBURGH AND LONDON 
 
% 
 
 Vtfebster Family Library of Vetennary 
 Cummings School of Veterinary Medicmit 
 
 Tufts University 
 
 200 Westtxxo Road 
 
 Morth Grafton MA 01536 
 
n^r'-itJfeli^^J