VERY EARLY HUNTING DAYS 11 



Gubbins. Everyone else discussed and talked. 

 He sat there thinking. 



Then it was over. 



" We'll all hunt or we'll none of us hunt," he 

 shot out, and I remember the hounds jogging 

 away towards Glenogera, the black caps bobbing 

 until they were all lost to view. 



Hunting was in a poor way after Mr. Gubbins 

 left. The country seethed all round and every- 

 one slept with some species of fire-arm near 

 them. 



My sister's was a gun called Brown Bess, which 

 she was to fire off as a signal for the police to come 

 down. My brother had a rifle, and my mother a 

 single-barrelled pistol, which was called Long Tom. 

 Long Tom m the hands of an excitable and com- 

 pletely intrepid lady nearly dealt death. 



The house awoke one morning to a valiant 

 " Stand or I fire," from the back stairs, and we 

 went rushing out to find my mother in a pink 

 dressing-gown and a rigid attitude levelling Long 

 Tom at something which grovelled and prayed. 



" They have come at last," said my mother 

 calmly. 



Boom went Brown Bess from my sister's 

 window, the explosion followed by a shriek ; out 

 came my younger brother with a rifle. 



" For the love of God, Masther Arthur, will ye 

 tell the missus to put down the gun," wailed the 

 well-known accents of Davy Walsh, the old car- 



