other property, were offered by the King
of Connaught, and about the same price was offered by the King of
Ulster. Irish Wolfhounds fought regularly in battle, through the
early centuries of our era; and fearsome warriors they were. Right
down to the period of a couple of centuries ago, a leash of Irish
Wolfhounds was considered a fitting and acceptable present for one
monarch, or lord, to offer to another king or great noble; while
from the earliest times, down to the day of Buffon, and, in our own
time, "Stonehenge," the naturalists have written of the Irish
Wolfhound as the greatest, that is finest, and "tallest of all
dogs."

But it was not alone in such matters as refraining from violent
exercise, and the taking of food whether inclined for it or not,
that a sort of prescience guided beautiful Tara at this time in her
new home beside the Sussex Downs. There came a morning when, as she
strolled about the strip of shrubbery and orchard which lay between
the stabling and the house, it occurred to her that it would be a
good thing to dig a hole somewhere in the ground; the sort of hole
or cave into which a great hound like herself could creep for
shelter if need be; a cave in which she could live for a while.
Tara did not know that the Master was watching her at this time;
but he was, and there was a sympathetic and understanding sort of
smile on his face, when Tara forced her way in between two large
shrubs, and began excavating. The earth was soft and moist there,
and Tara's powerful fore-feet scooped it out in regular shovelfuls,
for her hind feet to scatter in an earthy rain behind her. She made
a cavern as big as herself, and then divided the rest of the day
between the beautiful big dais in the coach-house, all dry, and
sweet, and clean, and her fragrant, carpeted great bed in "th'old
parish room." Lying there at her ease, with one eye on the Master's
shoulder, where it showed round the side of his high-topped
writing-table, Tara wondered vaguely why she had troubled to dig
that hole in the wet earth. But the Master knew all about it,
though he could not claim to have fifteen hundred years of
Wolfhound ancestry behind him, and he seemed quite satisfied.

On the following day Tara gravely inspected the hole she had dug,
and decided that it was not altogether good. So she went and dug
another in a rather more secluded spot; and then came back and
dozed comfortably at the Master's feet while he wrote. Later on i