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stuff I’m standing in. Masses of the stuff. And in the soft ground all around me, footprints I can only describe as bull-shaped. Nauseous but undeterred, I press on up the field, then surprise myself by going commando-style under an electric fence—a bit panicky, this bit, so I’m left with extensive grass stains, and a minor pulled muscle in the small of my back.
    I’m now on a half-obscured path between two fields. Humming to myself in order to ward off total mental collapse, I follow it up the hill at a brisk stride, adding a little semi-cantered hitch-kick every few steps, presumably in the hope that this will render me impossibly elusive to shotguns and bulls. At the top of the hill there’s a wall to the right, and beyond it, perfectly positioned to survey the countryside billowing away at 360° below it, the Bohonagh Stone Circle: thirteen slabs of granite, some of them taller than me, standing where they’ve been for 4,000 years.
    But the dry-stone wall is lined with a single-strand electric fence, with a second wire encircling the stones themselves. Bastard farmers. What a vindictive way to treat people who only want to experience the stones at first hand. But then the thought occurs: what if the motivation was something quite different? What if it’s just an attempt by a small farmer, earning an honest punt—plus massive EC subsidies, obviously—to protect the country’s ancient heritage from animals?
    But what animals?
    The bellow comes from over my right shoulder. The beast is black and white, barrel-chested, eighty yards or so away, diagonally down the field. The gate, the repmobile, and the rest of my life are somewhere in the middle distance beyond. As is the electric fence, which I’ll have to get under to give myself a chance. Anyway, can’t bulls jump them? Or if not, surely they’re so bloody hard that they can just crash through the flimsy tape as they thunder down on you in the mistaken belief that you’re some kind of Spanish exhibitionist.
    Heart pounding, back twingeing, bowels suddenly keen to get involved, I turn my back on the stupid bloody stones that have got me into this mess, and begin to edge down the hill, to my left. The bull backs off, head down, in that way that suggests backing off is just a momentum-gathering preliminary to charging forward. I speed up and head for the nearest point of the electric fence, all the while making a pitiful squeaking sound as I run, mentally reliving childhood promises never to do anything wrong ever again if only God will let me off this time.
    As I go to throw myself under the electrically charged cable, I stumble in a rutted hoofprint, and catch the wire with my forehead. Nothing. Except relief. The fence is just for show. The current isn’t even turned on. All over Europe, animals are being conned by farmers anxious to keep their electricity bills down, though I’ll bet they’re claiming the full whack from Brussels.
    But what if the bull knows that?
    The tape is between us, but the brute has now started to execute a distinctly threatening amble in my direction. Sprawled on my back, legs akimbo, I must make an inviting target. I couldn’t feel more vulnerable if I were wearing skintight Spanish jeans with red arrows pointing to the crotch, marked ‘Insert Horns Here’.
    But surely the gate to the lane, and safety, must only be yards away. Keeping my body perfectly still, I begin—slowly, ever so slowly, so as not to alarm the bull—to turn my head.
    There’s a man at the gate, watching me.
    ‘Have ya fallen and hurt yourself, or are ye just afraid of the cow?’

    Up at the farmhouse, surrounded by sixteen or seventeen of his children, it was clear that Mr Goggin hadn’t been making fun of me. It had been a concerned enquiry. He seemed devoid of any malice, quiet and painfully shy, with the look of a man who lives in constant dread of being asked if he plans on having any more kids.
    Next to the house was a nineteenth-century