This was the finishing touch required to round off the naturally vicious temper of the man who held Finn into a passion of sullen, brutal anger. He cursed unceasingly while the man in the cart made the necessary repairs with cord and a couple of sticks from the hedge; and with every curse there was a kick, or a vicious blow, or a savage jerk at the torturing slip-collar, and sometimes all three together. Finn could have killed the man with ease; but, so far, the thought of even biting him never occurred to the Wolfhound. Every hour that he had spent in the world had taught him that humans were his friends, his very kindly protectors, his guardians and governors, so to say. Every hour of his mother's life, with but very few exceptions, had borne the same belief in upon her, and her nature was the sweetest and gentlest imaginable. With his father, now, the case was somewhat otherwise. There were those who said that the rather taciturn and shy Dermot owed some of his wonderfully heavy coat to the mesalliance of a forbear of his with a Tibetan Sheep Dog of a half-wild sort, with a temper far from reliable. But, as yet at all events, Finn's temper was that of a clean run, well-bred English boy; frank, open, trusting, and kindly; and, sorely as he ached, sorely bewildered as he felt under the rain of blows and kicks, curses and strangling tugs at his collar, he had as yet no thought of vengeance. His only desire was for escape, and a return to the sweet, free life he knew beside the Downs. The man who held Finn instinctively recognised all this, and the knowledge whetted the savagery of his temper, and withdrew all restraint from its cruel indulgence. He had no conscious wish to injure the hound; quite the contrary, since Finn represented money to him, and money was what he desired more than anything else; but he was tired, things seemed to be going ill with him, his temper was thoroughly roused, and the innocent cause of all this, a sensitive, living creature, was tethered and helpless beside him; and so he kicked and cursed, and jerked at the lead, and found relief in Finn's gasps of pain and want of breath. When the shaft was mended, the tail-board of the little cart was let down, and, with a savage kick at Finn's hind-quarters, the man bade him "Get up, there, ---- ye! Get up, ye brute!" Another kick. Poor Finn tried to squirm forward under the cart to escape the heavy boot of his persecutor. Then he was furiously jerked backward and half throttled. "Steady with 'im, matey," said the other man. "Don't knock the dollars off of 'im." "Who asked you to shove your jaw in?" snarled the first man. "You didn't get the brute, did ye--curse him!" Another kick.