I could hardly believe my two eyes;
but, fakes, it was true enough; for presently it came walking down the
hill, quite leisurely at first, then a little faster, till at last it
came rolling at the rate of a fox hunt. "Twill be stopped at the bounds'
ditch," thinks I; but I was never more out in my reckoning, for it
bowled fair through the gap, and made directly up to me. "By the mortal
frost," says I, "I'm done for;" and away I scampered as fast as my legs
could carry me; but the skull came faster after me, for I could hear
every lump it gave against the stones. It's a long stretch of a hill
from the _berrin_ ground down to the road; but you'd think I wasn't
longer getting down than whilst you'd be saying "Jack Robinson." Sure
enough I did make great haste; but if I did, "the more haste the worse
speed," they say, and so by me any how, for I went souse up to my neck
in a dirty _Lochaune_ by the side of the road. Well, when I recovered a
little, what would I see but the skull at the edge of the _Lochaune_,
stuck fast in a furze bush, and grinning down at me. "Oh, you're there,"
says I; "I'll have one rap at you any how, for worse than die I can't;"
so I up with a lump of a blackthorn, I had in my fist, and gives it a
rap, when what should it be after all, but a huge rat, which had got
into the skull, and, trying to get out again, it made it to roll down
the hill in that frightful way.
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