atter by hitting him a whack across the back
with the barrels of his shooting-iron; in doing so, he broke off the
stock, clean as a whistle! It is useless to deny that Triangle _was_
mad; that he swore equal to an Erie Canal boatman; and that his fury so
alarmed the dog that he took to his heels and went--as Triangle
hoped--anywhere, head foremost.

[Illustration: "With a presence of mind truly unparalleled, she laid
down 'baby' upon the grass, and made fight with 'the spiteful
craturs.'"--_Page_ 169.]

With a face as long as a boot-jack, quite tuckered out and disgusted
with things as far as he had got, Triangle reached Jingo Hall, where he
met the warm welcome of his friend, Major Jingo, and soon recuperated
his good humor and physical activity by the contents of the Major's
"well-stocked" _wine-cellar_. Ashamed of the facts of the case, Triangle
trumped up a cock-and-bull story about the dog and gun.

After a season, the Triangles got settled away, and the first day or two
passed without anything extraordinary turning up, if we may except the
upturning of several flower-pots and hen's nests by the children. But
the third day opened ominously. Triangle's dog was found with one of the
Major's dead lambs under convoy, and the Irish hostler had caught him,
tied him up in the stable, and given him such a dressing that Ponto's
soul-case was nearly beaten out of him!

The next item was a yowl in the garden! Everybody rushed out--Mrs.
Triangle in her excitement, lest something had happened to "baby," and
Nora, the girl, struck the centre-table, upset the "Astral," and not
only demolished that ancient piece of furniture, but spilled enough
thick oil over the gilt-edged literature, table-cloth, and carpet, to
make a barrel of soft soap.

The Irish girl came bounding, screeching forth! She had been sauntering
through the garden, and ran against the bee-hives, when a bee up and at
her. With a presence of mind truly unparalleled, she laid down "baby"
upon the grass, and made fight with "the spiteful craturs;" and of
course she got her hands full, was beset by tens and hundreds, and was
stung in as many places by the pugnacious "divils." Nora was done for.
She went to bed; "baby" was found all right, laughing "fit to break its
yitty hearty party, at naughty Nora Dory," as Mrs. Triangle very
naturally expressed it.

These two tableaux had hardly reached their climax, when in rushed
Frederic Antonio Gustavus, with his capacio