her account with yours,
for I am much interested in these occurrences.'

'Why,' replied he, nothing loth to talk about himself, 'it happened this
fashion. Aa wes comin' back through the park cannily enough when close
beside the mussulyum oot spangs at us a great ugly brute of a durg
wivoot a sound to his pads. Aa'd heard nowt, but there he was glarin' at
us, an' showin' his great ugly fangs. "By gox, Geordie," I says to
maaself, "it's a mad durg ye have to fettle." Sae I lets oot wiv a kick
that would have shifted a bullock, but aal that happened was that he
seemed to catch haud o' my trousers, for I felt them rip. Gox! I
thinks, 'tis an evil sperrit, sae I set awa like a hare--game leg an'
aal--tearin' towards the park wall like a whippit, followed by the evil
sperrit that made no sound wiv his pads, but was growlin' terrible aal
the time.'

'Then it wasn't a _real_ dog?' I interrupted here.

'_Wasn't a real durg?_' replied Geordie indignantly, his eyebrows
puckering and his jowl coming forward aggressively.

'It made no noise with its feet, and you called it a spirit,' I
explained hastily.

'Aa's feared o' nowt,' said Geordie, 'that's livin', but when it comes
to evil sperrits 'tis the Priest should tackle them. Aa winnot.'

'So it was an evil spirit in the form of a dog,' I suggested; 'but what
was the precise form--mastiff, retriever, or collie perhaps, for the
Rector says there is a tale of a ghost of a drowned collie that haunts
the Park?'

'Collie be damned!' cried he decisively. 'An' as for what specie o' durg
it was hoo can Aa tell hoo many species there may be in Hell?'

'You had me there,' I acknowledged, smiling. 'Well, tell me how you
escaped from the brute.'

'He chivvied us aboot halfway te the wall, an' then I think he gied it
up; leastways when Aa gied a keek ower my shoulder as Aa drew near it he
wasn't there.'

'You didn't hear the dog dashing on you or galloping after you, and yet
you heard it growling, and felt it take a piece out of your trousers. It
seems half real, half Hell-hound!' I commented.

'It's easy talkin',' replied Geordie contemptuously, 'but if he had had
a hand o' yor breeks ye'd have knawn he was _damned_ real, Aa's warrant
ye,' and he spat on the ground with emphasis.

'My aunt saw the hound a year ago,' I continued, 'but it didn't chase
her; it only growled and frightened her.'

'Mevvies it kenned she was the Priest's wife,' suggested my companion.
Then with a gri