ul miniatures, and
finely-carved chimney-pieces were once prized by the old Irish
landlords.

To return to our garden. One year the apple crop was unusually
plentiful, and every Sunday inroads were made upon it by some
unknown persons. At last I decided to lie in wait at the dangerous
hour--about twelve o'clock--when the boys of the neighbourhood were
on their way home from Mass, and we were supposed to be busy with
our devotions three miles away. A little before eleven I slipped
out, accordingly, with a book, locked the door behind me, put the
key in my pocket, and lay down under a bush. When I had been reading
for some time, and had quite forgotten the thieves, I looked up at
some little stir and saw a young man, in his Sunday clothes, walking
up the path towards me. He stopped when he saw me, and for a moment
we gazed at each other with astonishment. At last, to make a move, I
said it was a fine day. 'It is indeed, sir,' he answered with a
smile, and then he turned round and ran for his life. I realized
that he was a thief and jumped up and ran after him, seeing, as I
did so, a flock of small boys swarming up the walls of the garden.
Meanwhile the young man ran round and round through the raspberry
canes, over the strawberry beds, and in and out among the apple
trees. He knew that if he tried to get over the wall I should catch
him, and that there was no other way out, as I had locked the gate.
It was heavy running, and we both began to get weary. Then I caught
my foot in a briar and fell. Immediately the young man rushed to the
wall and began scrambling up it, but just as he was drawing his leg
over the top I caught him by the heel. For a moment he struggled and
kicked, then by sheer weight I brought him down at my feet, and an
armful of masonry along with him. I caught him by the neck and tried
to ask his name, but found we were too breathless to speak.

For I do not know how long we sat glaring at each other, and gasping
painfully. Then by degrees I began to upbraid him in a whisper for
coming over a person's wall to steal his apples, when he was such a
fine, well-dressed, grownup young man. I could see that he was in
mortal dread that I might have him up in the police courts, which I
had no intention of doing, and when I finally asked him his name and
address he invented a long story of how he lived six miles away, and
had come over to this neighbourhood for Mass and to see a friend,
and then how he had got a