Days are but the pulse-beats of immortal time.—Sparks from Iron Shoes—Mac A'Rony.
It was the twenty-tooth of April. The inclement weather, which had rained supreme for forty hours, suddenly abdicated in favor of the presumptive sun and genial air apparent which ruled gloriously for some six hundred and nine minutes. Save that it lacked the odor of new-mown hay, it was a day fashioned after a donkey's own heart. However, a yard of fresh grass painted green would have satisfied my taste better than did the golden sun rays and the transparent air.
At ten o'clock Pye Pod, D. D. (donkey driver), sauntered off to do an errand, and then hastened to the stables to saddle and pack his two noble and fractious partners, Cheese and myself. I believe my erudite collaborator has already introduced to you my long-eared comrade.
Such a load as we were to carry! Of course, I got the worst of the bargain in which I had no voice. Said my master, as he rubbed my nose, "Mac, old boy, since you have become hardened to the trip by reason of your thirteen hundred mile creep (I nabbed at him vexedly), I'll just let you shoulder the two boxes." And, with nerve incarnate, the unbalanced Professor balanced on my back what seemed to me two one-ton cases of pig-iron. I believed my time had come. Even the unsophisticated Cheese, whispered to me nervously, "Our coffins, Mac, sure as Balaam!" and resumed the mastication of timothy hay, as if it were his last meal.
The pack-saddles were tightly cinched to us. Every time Pod pulled on the ropes under my belly I grunted as if in pain, although it only tickled me, and gnawed a half inch off the oaken manger in seeming agony; so, while he imagined he was squeezing all the breath out of me, I had still enough left to inflate a balloon.
That's how I fooled Pod. All this time he was talking to himself. He vowed that he would get even with a certain officious policeman, who had daily gloried in the exercise of his authority, by ordering him to lead his "confounded jackass" away from the front portal of the hotel, where crowds of curious people always gathered around us and blocked the way. His soliloquy grew louder and more fiery every moment. Even Cheese lifted his snoot out of the haymow and, tilting his left ear, whispered, "Say, Mac, our master must have some unholy motive in mind. Hold on to your wind. Don't let him lace those lockers on you, as a squaw would bind a pappoose to her back, for you may want to kick 'em off. Pod's daft."
Well, that suspicious jack's most grotesque foreboding was soon realized. Everything went well until we were nearly opposite the great double portal of the hotel, when, suddenly, I felt the saddle slipping round my girth. Another second and I was flat on my back, jerked high off my feet on top of the boxes. For a moment I could not realize the undignified posture I was in. Being roped securely to the boxes, all I could do was to kick at the flying sparrows, and bray as only a frightened donkey can.
Crowds quickly assembled. Excitement ran high. Cheese, instead of raising a hoof in my defense, dropped his ears and looked complacently on my animated heap like a country gawk. The hotel guests rushed out bare-headed, some of them fresh from the cafe with tripe and ice cream in hand, and wild-eyed pedestrians flocked to the scene of my troubles. Don barked excitedly and kept the throng back. The coolest one of the outfit was Pod. He stood quietly by, grinning and bowing to the open-air audience, as if he were the bandmaster and I the band.
I now recollected Cheese's advice, and chided myself for having expanded my lungs at the packing. The thought was vexing to one in my position. Immediate relief looked hopeless. Scared half to death, I brayed myself hoarse before a would-be liberator wedged through the crowd and order Pod to clear the thoroughfare. He was that pompous policeman. He eyed Pod severely, and glancing at my up-turned face, inquired:
"What's in them there boxes, Mister?"