CHRISTOPHER IN HIS SPORTING JACKET 



by a half-drunken carrier — did we consent to let thee 

 engage in a pitched battle with a mastiff victorious 

 in fifty fights — a famous shanker — and a throttler 

 beyond all compare. It was indeed a bloody business 

 — now growling along the glawr of the road — a hairy 

 hurricane — now snorting in the suffocating ditch — 

 now fair play on the clean and clear crown of the 

 causey — now rolling over and over through a chance- 

 open white little gate, into a cottage-garden — now 

 separated by choking them both with a cord — now 

 brought out again with savage and fiery eyes to the 

 scratch on a green plat round the signboard-swing- 

 ing tree in the middle of the village — auld women in 

 their mutches crying out, "Shame! whare's the min- 

 ister?^' — young women, with combs in their pretty 

 heads, blinking with pale and almost weeping faces 

 from low-lintelled doors — children crowding for sight 

 and safety on the louping-on-stane — and loud cries 

 ever and anon at each turn and eddy of the fight, of 

 "Well done, Fro, well done. Fro — see how he worries 

 his windpipe — well done, Fro!"" for Fro was the de- 

 light and glory of the whole parish, and the honour 

 of all its inhabitants, male and female, was felt to be 

 staked on the issue — while at intervals was heard the 

 harsh hoarse voice of the carrier and his compeers, 

 cursing and swearing in triumph in a many-oathed 

 language peculiar to the race that drive the broad- 



[ ^^ ] 



