“Quiet, stupid!” cried Kenneth; “it isn’t Tonal’.”
“How wow!” howled Sneeshing.
“Be quiet, sir! Yes, I will.”
He threatened the dog with one of the joints of the rod, and then threw it back over his left shoulder, as he lay with his head raised, and began to squeeze the pillow in imitation of a bag with its pipes.
“Now, Sneeshing, go ahead! Give us the Hieland Fling!”
Then, in imitation of the pipes, Kenneth began, and not badly,—
“Waugh! waugh!” and went on with the air “Tullochgorum,” but Sneeshing only threw up his head and howled.
“Do you want me to whack you?” cried Kenneth. “Now, then, up you go, and we’ll begin again.”
“Waugh! waugh!”
Sneeshing had flinched from the rod, and now he gave his master a piteous look, but rose up on his hind legs and began to lift first one and then the other, drooping his forepaws and then raising them as he turned solemnly round to the imitation music. Twice over he came down on all-fours, for the bed was very soft and awkward on account of Kenneth’s legs and its irregularities, but he rose up again, and the mock pipes were in full burst, and the dogs who formed the audience evidently in a great state of excitement, as they blinked and panted, when there was a tremendous roar of laughter, which brought all to a conclusion, the dogs barking furiously as Mr Curzon came forward with The Mackhai.