Beasts and Super-Beasts | Page 8

certain remarks under their breath, in
which the word "beast" was prominent, and probably had no reference
to Tarquin.
"I find I have got another half-crown," said Mrs. Stossen in a shaking
voice; "here you are. Now please fetch some one quickly."
Matilda slipped down from the tree, took possession of the donation,
and proceeded to pick up a handful of over-ripe medlars from the grass
at her feet. Then she climbed over the gate and addressed herself
affectionately to the boar-pig.
"Come, Tarquin, dear old boy; you know you can't resist medlars when
they're rotten and squashy."
Tarquin couldn't. By dint of throwing the fruit in front of him at
judicious intervals Matilda decoyed him back to his stye, while the
delivered captives hurried across the paddock.
"Well, I never! The little minx!" exclaimed Mrs. Stossen when she was
safely on the high road. "The animal wasn't savage at all, and as for the

ten shillings, I don't believe the Fresh Air Fund will see a penny of it!"
There she was unwarrantably harsh in her judgment. If you examine the
books of the fund you will find the acknowledgment: "Collected by
Miss Matilda Cuvering, 2s. 6d."

THE BROGUE
The hunting season had come to an end, and the Mullets had not
succeeded in selling the Brogue. There had been a kind of tradition in
the family for the past three or four years, a sort of fatalistic hope, that
the Brogue would find a purchaser before the hunting was over; but
seasons came and went without anything happening to justify such
ill-founded optimism. The animal had been named Berserker in the
earlier stages of its career; it had been rechristened the Brogue later on,
in recognition of the fact that, once acquired, it was extremely difficult
to get rid of. The unkinder wits of the neighbourhood had been known
to suggest that the first letter of its name was superfluous. The Brogue
had been variously described in sale catalogues as a light-weight hunter,
a lady's hack, and, more simply, but still with a touch of imagination, as
a useful brown gelding, standing 15.1. Toby Mullet had ridden him for
four seasons with the West Wessex; you can ride almost any sort of
horse with the West Wessex as long as it is an animal that knows the
country. The Brogue knew the country intimately, having personally
created most of the gaps that were to be met with in banks and hedges
for many miles round. His manners and characteristics were not ideal in
the hunting field, but he was probably rather safer to ride to hounds
than he was as a hack on country roads. According to the Mullet family,
he was not really road- shy, but there were one or two objects of dislike
that brought on sudden attacks of what Toby called the swerving
sickness. Motors and cycles he treated with tolerant disregard, but pigs,
wheelbarrows, piles of stones by the roadside, perambulators in a
village street, gates painted too aggressively white, and sometimes, but
not always, the newer kind of beehives, turned him aside from his
tracks in vivid imitation of the zigzag course of forked lightning. If a
pheasant rose noisily from the other side of a hedgerow the Brogue

would spring into the air at the same moment, but this may have been
due to a desire to be companionable. The Mullet family contradicted
the widely prevalent report that the horse was a confirmed crib-biter.
It was about the third week in May that Mrs. Mullet, relict of the late
Sylvester Mullet, and mother of Toby and a bunch of daughters,
assailed Clovis Sangrail on the outskirts of the village with a breathless
catalogue of local happenings.
"You know our new neighbour, Mr. Penricarde?" she vociferated;
"awfully rich, owns tin mines in Cornwall, middle-aged and rather
quiet. He's taken the Red House on a long lease and spent a lot of
money on alterations and improvements. Well, Toby's sold him the
Brogue!"
Clovis spent a moment or two in assimilating the astonishing news;
then he broke out into unstinted congratulation. If he had belonged to a
more emotional race he would probably have kissed Mrs. Mullet.
"How wonderfully lucky to have pulled it off at last! Now you can buy
a decent animal. I've always said that Toby was clever. Ever so many
congratulations."
"Don't congratulate me. It's the most unfortunate thing that could have
happened!" said Mrs. Mullet dramatically.
Clovis stared at her in amazement.
"Mr. Penricarde," said Mrs. Mullet, sinking her voice to what she
imagined to be an impressive whisper, though it rather resembled a
hoarse, excited squeak, "Mr. Penricarde has just begun to pay attentions
to Jessie. Slight at first, but now unmistakable. I was a fool not to have