stake, and I pwotest against
the twick."

"We've got the trick, and we'll keep it, however," said Murphy.

Scatterbrain's agent said 't was unfair, and desired the polling-clerk
not to record the vote.

"Didn't every one hear him say, '_I vote for Egan_'?" asked
Murphy.

"But he didn't mean it, sir," said the agent.

"I don't care what he meant, but I know he said it," retorted Murphy;
"and every one round knows he said it; and as I mean what I say myself,
I suppose every other gentleman does the same--down with the vote,
Mister Polling-clerk."

A regular wrangle now took place between the two agents, amidst the
laughter of the bystanders, whose merriment was increased by Furlong's
vehement assurances he did not mean to vote as Murphy wanted to make it
appear he had; but the more he protested, the more the people laughed.
This increased his energy in fighting out the point, until Scatterbrain's
agent recommended him to desist, for that he was only interrupting their
own voters from coming up. "Never mind now, sir," said the agent, "I'll
appeal to the assessor about that vote."

"Appeal as much as you like," said Murtough; "that vote is as dead as a
herring to you."

Furlong, finding further remonstrance unavailing, as regarded his vote,
delivered to the sheriff the message of O'Grady, who was boiling over
with impatience, in the meantime, at the delay of his messenger, and
anxiously expecting the arrival of sheriff and police to coerce the
villainous trumpeter and chastise the applauding crowd, which became
worse and worse every minute.

They exhibited a new source of provocation to O'Grady, by exposing a
rat-trap hung at the end of a pole, with the caged vermin within, and
vociferated "Rat, rat," in the pauses of the trumpet. Scatterbrain,
remembering the hearing they gave him the previous day, hoped to
silence them, and begged O'Grady to permit _him_ to address them;
but the whim of the mob was up, and could not be easily diverted, and
Scatterbrain himself was hailed with the name of "Rat-catcher."

"You cotch him--and I wish you joy of him!" cried one.

"How much did you give for him?" shouted another.

"What did you bait your thrap with?" roared a third.

"A bit o' _threasury bacon_," was the answer from a stentorian voice
amidst the multitude, who shouted with laughter at the apt rejoinder,
which they reiterated from one end of the crowd to the other, and the
cry of "threasury bacon" rang far and w