286 GARRYOWEN 



said the girl. " I'll get something for you at once. 

 There's a tin of tongue — " 



" Don't ! " said Mr Dashwood. " Don't mention 

 tinned meat or biscuits to me ! I've lived on them. 

 Oh, Lord! don't let me think of it! " 



" An egg? " 



" Yes, an egg — anything but tinned meat. It's 

 almost as bad as Giveen." 



In five minutes the egg was boiled, and haK-an- 

 hour after Mr Dashwood, young again, smoking 

 a pipe of French's, began his recital. 



He told aU we know : how he had " shanghaied " 

 Mr Giveen, how that gentleman had tried to escape 

 and had stuck in the window. " I pulled and 

 hauled," said Bobby, " but it was all no use, and, 

 upon my Sam, I thought it would be a business 

 of puUing the cottage down." 



" How did you get him loose at last? " asked 

 French. " And why the deuce didn't you leave 

 him stuck there till the race was over? You could 

 have fed him from the outside." 



"Upon my soul, I never thought of that!" 

 said Mr Dashwood. " I felt I had to get him 

 free somehow, and then I thought of a patent 

 dodge. I'd heard of a chap lighting a fire of straw 

 under a horse that wouldn't go, and I knew the 

 only way to free the beggar was to make him use 

 ail his exertions and even more; so I got some 

 straw out of the outhouse place and made a big 

 wisp of it and fit it. Made a torch, you know. 

 ' What are you doing? ' he said. ' You wait and 



