In the autumn me bowld mascot gets a wee trifle powerful by dint o’ the high-feedin’ and the natural nature of the crature.  Herself, wid her iligant lady’s nose, is afther noticin’ it, and she sends wan o’ the gerrls to tell meself and Mikeen to wash the baste.

“There will be murdher done this day,” says I to the lad, “but ’tis the orders—­go get the cart-rope and the chain off the bull-dog, and we’ll do it.  Faith, it isn’t all the bravery that’s at the Front,” says I.

“That’s the true wurrd,” says he, rubbin’ the lumps on his shins, the poor boy.

“Oh, Delaney,” says the domestic gerrl, drawin’ a bottle from her apron pocket, “Herself says will ye plaze be so obligin’ to sprinkle the mascot wid a dropeen of this ody-koloney scent—­mebbe it will quench his powerfulness, she says.”

I put the bottle in me pocket.  We tripped up me brave goat with the rope, got the bull’s collar and chain, and dragged him away towards the pond, him buckin’ and ragin’ between us like a Tyrone Street lady in the arms of the poliss.  To hear the roars he let out of him would turn your hearts cowld as lead, but we held on.

The Saints were wid us; in half-an-hour we had him as wet as an eel, and broke the bottle of ody-koloney over his back.

He was clane mad.  “God save us all when he gets that chain off him!” I says.  “God save us it is!” says Mikeen, looking around for a tree to shin.

Just at the minut we heard a great screechin’ o’ dogs, and through the fence comes the harrier pack that the Reserve orficers kept in the camp beyond. ("Harriers” they called them, but, begob! there wasn’t anythin’ they wouldn’t hunt from a fox to a turkey, those ones.)

“What are they afther chasin’?” says Mikeen.

“’Tis a stag to-day, be the newspapers,” I says, “but the dear knows they’ll not cotch him this month, he must be gone by this half-hour, and the breath is from them, their tongues is hangin’ out a yard,” I says.

’Twas at that moment the Blessed Saints gave me wisdom.

“Mikeen,” I says, “drag the mascot out before them; we’ll see sport this day.”

“Herself—­” he begins.

“Hoult your whisht,” says I, “and come on.”  With that we dragged me bowld goat out before the dogs and let go the chain.

The dogs sniffed up the strong blast of ody-koloney and let a yowl out of them like all the banshees in the nation of Ireland, and the billy legged it for his life—­small blame to him!

Meself and Mikeen climbed a double to see the sport.

“They have him,” says Mikeen.  “They have not,” says I; “the crature howlds them by two lengths.”

“He has doubled on them,” says Mikeen; “he is as sly as a Jew.”

“He is forninst the rabbit holes now,” I says.  “I thank the howly Saints he cannot burrow.”

“He has tripped up—­they have him bayed,” says Mikeen.

And that was the mortal truth, the dogs had him.