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Just before four o’clock Considine suddenly collapsed, utterly exhausted. He had to be carried over to the fence. A crowd gathered around, and the rector, Mr. Robertson, gave him a swig from his brandy-flask that revived him. He made an effort to go back to work, but he was unable to rise.”Stay there,” said his wife angrily, “you’re finished. I’ll carry on myself.” Rolling up her sleeves farther on her fat arms, she went back to the reaping hook, and with a loud yell began to reap furiously.”Bravo,” cried McDara, “I’ll give the woman a special prize. Gallagher,” he cried, hitting the doctor on the shoulder, ” after all … the Irish race … ye know what I mean… man, alive.”

But all centred their attention on the struggle between Bodkin and Gill. Spurred by rage, Bodkin had made a supreme effort, and he began to gain ground once more. His immense body, moving from left to right and back again across his line of reaping, seemed to swallow the long yellow rye-stalks, so quickly did they fall before it. And as the sheaf was completed his lean wife grabbed it up and tied it. But still, when Bodkin paused at five o’clock to cast a look behind him, there was Gill coming with terrible regularity. Bodkin suddenly felt all the weariness of the day overcome him.

It struck him first in the shape of an intense thirst. He sent his wife up to the fence for their extra can of tea. When she came back with it he began to drink. But the more he drank the thirstier he became. His friends in the crowd of spectators shouted at him in warning, but his thirst maddened him. He kept drinking. The shore-wall and victory were very near now. He kept looking towards it in a dazed way as he whirled his hook. And he kept drinking. Then his senses began to dull. He became sleepy. His movements became almost unconscious. He only saw the wall, and he fought on. He began to talk to himself. He reached the wall at one end of his strip. He had only to cut down to the other end and finish. Three sheaves more, and then Best man in Inverara … Five-Pound Note .

But just then a ringing cheer came to his ears, and the cry rose on the air: “Gill has won.” Bodkin collapsed with a groan.