OUR SENTIMENTAL GARDEN 



<And here we may parenthetically remember a charming 

 and typical spectacle which once met our eyes in the 

 County Wicklow : a local police station, a large placard 

 commanding that all dogs shall be muzzled, and five or six 

 curs of different low degrees snapping untrammelled in the 

 sunshine at the feet of two smiling members of the con- 

 stabulary. 



Some brutish Saxon member of our party stops to point 

 out the discrepancy, 



" Unmuzzled, is it ? " says the elder policeman genially. 

 " And, begorra, so it is, ma'am. But, sure, isn't that Tim 

 Connolly's little dog? Sure, what 'ud we be muzzling 

 him for ? Thim orders is only for stray dogs ! "> 



We drove away across the cobbled Dublin streets at a 

 hand gallop. Whether the poor animal that drew us had 

 to be kept at this unnatural speed lest it should collapse 

 altogether, or whether our "jarvey" had had more than 

 one pull at the black bottle I know not / certainly we went 

 in peril of our lives. Shaving off corners, striking the edge 

 of the curb, oscillating violently from side to side, the 

 antique vehicle threatened at every leap and bound to 

 break into fragments like a pantomime joke. The Dublin 

 cab is a thing apart. From the musty straw upon which 

 your feet rest, to the dilapidated blue velveteen cushion 

 upon which you leap, to its wooden walls and rattling 

 windows, you would not find its like upon any other point 

 of the globe. It searches you to your least bone socket / 

 and the noise of its career deafens your wails on the 

 principle of the " painless extractor " at the fair, who blows 

 a trumpet for every wrench. 

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