plaguey cachinnations to rouse me from my sleep and make me writhe
and clench my nails into my palms.

I went forth privily in the night-time, and turned his cattle into
his fields, and in the morning heard his whooping laugh as he drove
them out again. "It is nothing," he said; "the poor, dumb beasties
are not to be blamed for straying into fatter pastures."

He had a dog he called "Mars," a big, splendid brute, part
deer-hound and part blood-hound, and resembling both. Mars was a
great delight to him, and they were always together. But I bided
my time, and one day, when opportunity was ripe, lured the animal
away and settled for him with strychnine and beefsteak. It made
positively no impression on John Claverhouse. His laugh was as
hearty and frequent as ever, and his face as much like the full
moon as it always had been.

Then I set fire to his haystacks and his barn. But the next morning,
being Sunday, he went forth blithe and cheerful.

"Where are you going?" I asked him, as he went by the cross-roads.

"Trout," he said, and his face beamed like a full moon. "I just dote
on trout."

Was there ever such an impossible man! His whole harvest had gone up
in his haystacks and barn. It was uninsured, I knew. And yet, in the
face of famine and the rigorous winter, he went out gayly in quest
of a mess of trout, forsooth, because he "doted" on them! Had gloom
but rested, no matter how lightly, on his brow, or had his bovine