Madam, - About a year ago, my wife Mary, a Sligo lady, and I decided to leave Dublin and now we are living at the bottom of the Ox Mountains among the sheep farmers - and we love it.
The air these days is full of joyous expectation; the farmers seem to operate 24/7, lights on in the barns all night, busy with the birth of lambs. The young lambs' exuberance in this sunny weather is a wonder to behold. What a change after 30 years in Stillorgan!
We woke yesterday morning to the sight of our all-white lady cat crouching down opposite the most wonderful specimen of a fox you ever did see. My wife let out a yell, and the fox bounded off; but wow, what a beauty! It looks like it may soon be curtains for the cat, who is a great wee hunter. She brings mice home all the time; used to bring them into the house until Mary closed the window at night. The cat now leaves the mice outside the front door, so Mary exits the house from the back.
My wife loves the cat, which normally has the run of the house. But now she is faced with a dilemma. Does she leave a window open so that the cat can escape the fox, or is she more afraid of the mice? - Yours, etc,
JOHN F HIGGINS, Drummartin, Tubbercurry, Co Sligo.