Tim often said he would be a soldier when he came to be a man, and was touchy on the point. "Shoot, is it?" said he, picking up another stone; "you blackguard, stand where ye are and I'll show yez." And he let fly and struck me again on the self-same place; and I confess I admired his skill more than his brotherly love. I picked up the stone and flung it back. But the wind took it so that it struck not Tim but the ewe. Whereat Tim laughed loudly and called me a French spalpeen. That was more than I could bear. "I'll fight you for that," said I, flinging my cap on the ground and stamping a foot on it. "Come on wid ye," retorted Tim, giving his buckle a hitch. And there, on the lonely, wind-swept cliff, we two brothers stood up to one another. Con, the dog, limped between us with a whine. "You might tie the dog to the gate till we're done, Barry," said Tim. "You're right, Tim," said I; "I will." It took no long time, but 'twas long enough to cool my blood, and when I returned to Tim I had less stomach for the fight than before. "Was it 'Frenchman' you said?" asked I, hoping he might say no. "Troth and I did," said he. But it seemed to me he too was less fiery than when he spoke last. So we fought. And I know not how it went. We were a fair match. What I lacked in strength I made up for in quickness, and if Tim hit me hard I hit him often. But it was a miserable business, and our hearts were sorer than our bodies. For we loved one another as we loved our own lives. And on a day like this, when mother lay dying at home, and father was out with the trawlers in the tempest, we lacked spirit to fight in earnest. Only when Tim called me "Frenchman" it was not in me to stand meekly by. I know that when it was over, and we parted sulky and bruised each his own way, I flung myself on my face at the edge of the cliff and wished I had never been born. How long I lay I know not. When I looked up the day was dark with tempest. The whistle of the wind about my ears mingled with the hoarse thunder of the surf as it broke on the beach, four hundred feet below me, and swept round the point into the lough. The taste of brine was on my lips, and now and again flakes of foam whirled past me far inland. From Dunaff to Malin the coast was one long waste of white water. And already the great Atlantic rollers, which for a day past had brought their solemn warning in from the open, were breaking miles out at sea, and racing in on the shore like things pursued. As for me, my spirits rose as I looked out and saw it all. For I loved the sea in its angry moods. And this promise of tempest seemed somehow to accord with the storm that was raging in my own breast. It made me forget Tim and the sheep, and even mother. I tried to get up on my feet, but the wind buffeted me back before I reached my knees, and I was fain to lie prone, with my nose to the storm, blinking through half-closed eyes out to sea.