An Irish retriever-pup of the Shannon breed, Pat by name, was undergoing tuition on the sward close by the kennels, Rose’s hunting-whip being passed through his collar to restrain erratic propensities.  The particular point of instruction which now made poor Pat hang out his tongue, and agitate his crisp brown curls, was the performance of the ‘down-charge’; a ceremony demanding implicit obedience from the animal in the midst of volatile gambadoes, and a simulation of profound repose when his desire to be up and bounding was mighty.  Pat’s Irish eyes were watching Rose, as he lay with his head couched between his forepaws in the required attitude.  He had but half learnt his lesson; and something in his half-humorous, half-melancholy look talked to Rose more eloquently than her friend Ferdinand at her elbow.  Laxley was her assistant dog-breaker.  Rose would not abandon her friends because she had accepted a lover.  On the contrary, Rose was very kind to Ferdinand, and perhaps felt bound to be so to-day.  To-day, also, her face was lighted; a readiness to colour, and an expression of deeper knowledge, which she now had, made the girl dangerous to friends.  This was not Rose’s fault but there is no doubt among the faculty that love is a contagious disease, and we ought not to come within miles of the creatures in whom it lodges.

Pat’s tail kept hinting to his mistress that a change would afford him satisfaction.  After a time she withdrew her wistful gaze from him, and listened entirely to Ferdinand:  and it struck her that he spoke particularly well to-day, though she did not see so much in his eyes as in Pat’s.  The subject concerned his departure, and he asked Rose if she should be sorry.  Rose, to make him sure of it, threw a music into her voice dangerous to friends.  For she had given heart and soul to Evan, and had a sense, therefore, of being irredeemably in debt to her old associates, and wished to be doubly kind to them.

Pat took advantage of the diversion to stand up quietly and have a shake.  He then began to kiss his mistress’s hand, to show that all was right on both sides; and followed this with a playful pretence at a bite, that there might be no subsequent misunderstanding, and then a bark and a whine.  As no attention was paid to this amount of plain-speaking, Pat made a bolt.  He got no farther than the length of the whip, and all he gained was to bring on himself the terrible word of drill once more.  But Pat had tasted liberty.  Irish rebellion against constituted authority was exhibited.  Pat would not:  his ears tossed over his head, and he jumped to right and left, and looked the raggedest rapparee that ever his ancestry trotted after.  Rose laughed at his fruitless efforts to get free; but Ferdinand meditatively appeared to catch a sentiment in them.

’Down-charge, Sir, will you?  Ah, Pat!  Pat!  You’ll have to obey me, my boy.  Now, down-charge!’

While Rose addressed the language of reason to Pat, Ferdinand slipped in a soft word or two.  Presently she saw him on one knee.