I did not. In the long and tear-stained annals of the family dogs but one greyhound was in my memory, the saintly and beautiful Gazelle, own niece to "Master McGrath," as was recited with bated breath to new governesses and other of the unenlightened, coupled with large statements as to her uncomputable value had not her tail in youth been shut into a stable door and given a double angle like a bayonet.
Rickeen was occupied, to some extent, in felling a young ash tree. He swung in half a score of blows that made it shiver, and presently came to the expected pause.
"Faith thim was the dogs—! My brother Tom was butler here the same time. B'leeve me 'twas himself was souple! He'd run home any minute in the day, two miles, and ye wouldn't hardly feel him gone."
This remarkable accomplishment on the part of the butler was allowed to sink in, as it deserved.
"He had a tarrier, and one day going through the Wood of Annagh himself and the tarrier wakened a hare, and the two o' thim was hunting her through and fro, and he cursing the full of a house on the tarrier. He shtud then on the big rock that's in it, and he let a whistle on his two fingers. The two greyhounds was sthretched within at the kitchen fire up at the Big House, and sorra word of lie I'm tellin', but Poor Fellow put an ear on him, and the two of them legged it out of the kitchen and away with them to the wood, and they never stopped nor stayed till they found Tom, and themselves and the tarrier killed the hare."
The big rock and the Big House were severed by an Irish mile of tree trunks and briars, but criticism is the last thing required from a listener, and I hope I played my part.
RICKEEN
Rickeen was again possessed by a spasm of industry: the chips flew out, the tall young ash cracked, and sank into the arms of its neighbours. There was a singular simplicity about the forestry of the establishment. When the bitter cry of the cook went forth for wood wherewith to cook the impending meal, Rickeen prayed that the divil might roast and baste all the women in Ireland, and cut down a convenient young tree. By this means the plantations were lightly thinned at the ends nearest the house, and as a general thing the cook gave notice every three weeks, which prevented any unwholesome stagnation.
"But as for dogs," continued Rickeen, a little later, as he snicked off the greeny-grey branches, "the grandest dog ever was in this counthry was Mullowny's. Ye couldn't know what kind of a breed was in him, but ye'd have to like him, he was that spotted."