Returning from exile, I see no reason why other animals should not be included here (but I draw the line at sheep).

Rambling Sam

Dedicated to John from Hull

Rambling Sam was the meanest old hamster,
To work on the trawlers of Hull.
He battled with codfish and herring,
And he once won a fight with a gull.

One day as he rambled through Hessle,
All the pubs shut their doors in alarm;
And mothers called out to their children
To come home before Sammy did harm.

Hessle Road was as empty as Skegness
On a cold, frosty, February night.
Sammy strolled on down the pavement,
When something came into his sight.

A great ball of fur stood and faced him,
And made him stop dead in his track.
It was Geordie MacDirble the Gerbil,
Who'd sailed down in his old fishing smack.

The two stood and glared at each other;
Sammy hissed, and then started to spit,
Geordie showed Sammy his canines,
Then they scratched, and they kicked, and they bit.

They fought all along the quays and the docks,
With blood spattered all over the quarter,
Till they came to the edge of the river, and then-
Plop! they both of them fell in the water.

There was cheering in Hessle, and havoc in Hull,
When the news of Sam's drowning was spread.
In Grimsby, and Whitby, and even in Staithes,
They flew flags when they heard he was dead.

But some nights when there's mist on the Humber,
By the docks you may hear a deep growl.
Rambling Sam may have met with his number,
But his ghost still goes there on the prowl.

Back to the Dublin Underground another day perhaps. Did you know that the Railway once employed an engineer called Frank Dunlop? He designed a plan for a new set of lines which he named the Inner and Outer Tube. Sadly his plans were rejected by the Board, and he went to take his ideas elsewhere.