As they pulled and tugged, however, it was evident that the struggle was going against him--a hoarse, alarming howl once or twice broke from him, that intimated terror and distress on his part.
"That's right, Kate," they shouted, "you have him--press tight--the windpipe's goin'-- bravo! he'll soon stagger an' come down, an' then you may do as you like." They tugged on, and dragged, and panted, with the furious vehemence of the exertion; when at length Philip shouted, in a voice half-stifled by strangulation, "Let g--o--o--o, I--I sa--y--y; ah! ah! ah!" Bat now ran over in a spirit of glee and triumph that cannot well be described, and clapping his wife on the back, shouted--"Well done, Kate; stick to him for half a minute and he's yours.

Bravo! you clip o' perdition, bravo!" He had scarcely uttered the words when the giant carcass of Philip tottered and fell, dragging Kate along with it, who never for a moment lost or loosened her hold.

Her opponent now began to sprawl and kick out his feet from a sense of suffocation, and in attempting to call for assistance, nothing but low, deep gurgling noises could issue from his lips, now livid with the pressure on his throat and covered with foam.
His face, too, at all times dark and savage, became literally black, and he uttered such sternutations as, on seeing that they were accompanied by the diminished struggles which betoken exhaustion, induced Teddy to rush over for the purpose of rescuing him from her clutches.
"Aisy," said the others; "let them alone--a little thing will do it now--it's almost over--she has given him his gruel--an' divil's cure to him--he knew well enough what she could do--but he would have it." Faint convulsive movements were all now that could be noticed in the huge limbs of their brother, and still the savage tigress was at his throat, when her husband at length said:-- "It's time, Ned--it's time--she may carry it too far--he's quiet enough now.

Come away, Kate, it's all right--let him alone--let go your hoult of him." Kate, however, as if she had tasted his blood, would listen to no such language; all the force, and energies, and bloody instincts of the incarnate fury were aroused within her, and she still stuck to her victim.
"Be japers she'll kill him," shouted Bat, rushing to her; "come, Ned, till we unclasp her--take care--pull quickly--bloody wars, he's dead!--Kate, you divil!--you fury of hell! let go--let go, I say." Kate, however, heard him not, but still tugged and stuck to the throat of Philip's quivering carcass, until by a united effort they at length disentangled her iron clutches from it, upon which she struggled and howled like a beast of prey, and attempted with a strength that seemed more akin to the emotion of a devil than that of a woman to get at him again and again, in order to complete her work.
"Come, Kate," said her husband, "you're a Trojan--by japers you're a Trojan; you've settled him any way--is there life in him ?" he asked, "if there is, dash wather or something in his face, an' drag him up out o' that--ha! ha! Well done, Kate; only for you we'd lead a fine life wid him--ay! an' a fine life that is--a hard life we led until you did come--there now, more power to you--by the livin' Counthryman, there's not your aquil in Europe--come now, settle down, an' don't keep all movin' that way as if you wor at him again--sit down now, an' here's another glass of whiskey for you." In the mean time, Ned and Teddy Phats succeeded in recovering Philip, whom they dragged over and placed upon a kind of bench, where in a few minutes he recovered sufficiently to be able to speak--but ever and anon he shook his head, and stretched his neck, and drew his breath deeply, putting his hands up from time to time as if he strove to set his windpipe more at ease.
"Here Phil, my hairo," said his triumphant brother Bat, "take another glass, an' may be for all so strong and murdherin' as you are wid others you now know--an' you knew before what our woman' can do at home wid you." "I've--hoch--hoch--I've done wid her--she's no woman; there's a devil in her, an' if you take my advice, it's to Priest M'Scaddhan you'd bring her, an' have the same devil prayed out of her--I that could murdher ere a man in the parist a'most!" "Lave Bryan M'Mahon out," said Kate.
"No I won't," replied Phil, sullenly, and with a voice still hoarse, "no, I won't--I that could make smash of ere a man in the parish, to be throttled into perdition by a blasted woman.

She's a devil, I say; for the last ten minutes I seen nothin' but fire, fire, fire, as red as blazes, an' I hard somethin' yellin', yellin', in my ears." "Ay!" replied Kate, "I know you did--that was the fire of hell you seen, ready to resave you; an' the noise you hard was the voices of the devils that wor comin' for your sowl--ay, an' the voices of the two wives you murdhered--take care then, or I'll send you sooner to hell than you dhrame of." The scowl which she had in return for this threat was beyond all description.
"Oh, I have done wid you," he replied; "you're not right, I say--but never mind, I'll put a pin in M'Mahon's collar for this--ay will I." "Don't!" she exclaimed, in one fearful monosyllable, and then she added in a low condensed whisper, "or if you do, mark the consequence." "Trot, Phil," said Teddy, "I think you needn't throuble your head about M'Mahon--he's done fwhor." "An' mark me," said Kate, "I'll take care of the man that done for him.
I know him well, betther than he suspects, an' can make him sup sorrow whenever I like--an' would, too, only for one thing." "An' fwhat's dhat wan thing ?" asked Phats.
"You'll know it when you're ouldher, may be," replied Kate; "but you must be ouldher first--I can keep my own secrets, thank God, an' will, too--only mark me all o' yez; you know well what I am--let no injury come to Bryan M'Mahon.