“Galatea! Stop! Come back!”
Then he remembered her commands, and, seeing that she ran faster than ever, prudently turned his steps in the opposite direction. But he couldn’t feel his feet touch the ground. Yet, in the midst of his tumult of exultation, he was puzzled. Suddenly he smote himself on the chest and exclaimed:—
“Of course. It’s because I had sense enough to be polite to the pig.”
IV
The Obsequies of Bos Nemo
Not all was gladness and light in the entwined lives of Bos, Equus and Co. There came a day early in July when the confidence of Galatea and the Poet in their four-legged partners was stretched almost to the breaking-point. But for the wisdom of the Poet, which assured him that, after all, civilization is only a thin veneer which is liable to crack open under stress of provocation and reveal the savage man or the unenlightened beast, Mrs. Cowslip and her bull-calf, on that memorable day, would have been condemned to solitary confinement in the barn, while Napoleon, the bull-terrier, would have fallen victim to the flimsiest of circumstantial evidence.
Ordinarily the activities of Bos, Equus and Co. did not have their daily awakening until at least an hour of sunshine had striven with the dew-laden meadow. Gabriel’s duties were light, and rheumatic warnings urged him against braving early damps. Amanda, most energetic of housewives, refrained from disturbing her pots and pans out of regard for the Poet and his sister, who dearly loved that last hour of slumber made more sweet by the chirpings of early birds under their windows.
On this particular morning the dozing Poet was conscious that the voices of the birds were eclipsed by ominous rumblings which, instead of arousing him to complete consciousness, plunged him into the midst of a perilous adventure. He was on the deck of an ocean liner enveloped in the dense fogs of that awesome region off the Banks of Newfoundland. His body and soul were shaken by the vibrations of the siren, whose long-drawn warning was being echoed from out of the mists. No, it was not an echo—it was another siren. Its menace was growing louder! A ghastly gray shape hove near. The officer on the bridge seemed frozen with terror. The relentless ocean, scoffing at sirens and rudders, was hurling two ships into a fatal embrace. The Poet jumped for a life-preserver, striking his head violently upon—upon an old-fashioned walnut bedpost.
Then he realized that it was the melancholy voice of Mrs. Cowslip, interrupted by lamenting bellows from Gustavius, that had so nearly brought him to a watery grave. He ran to the open window, and heard Amanda complaining:
“Gabe, what on earth is the matter with the critters? For the land sakes do git up!”