did. Though Barney and Moira were afraid of the fairies, they were still

more afraid of displeasing Winifred. I stopped at last, holding my sides with merriment and begging of Winifred to let me rest. She threw herself, in a very spirit of mischief, on top of a mound. This proceeding evoked exclamations of horror from Moira and Barney.

"To lie upon a rath!" groaned Moira. "It's bewitched you'll be and turnin' into somethin' before our eyes."

"Or spirited away underground!" added Barney; "or laid under a spell that you'd ever and always be a child."

"I'd like that," remarked Winifred, settling herself more comfortably upon the mound. "I don't want to grow up or be old ever."

She gazed up at the moon, seeming to see in its far-shining kingdom some country of perpetual youth.

"She'd like it! The Lord save us!" cried Barney. "It's wishin' for a fairy spell she is. Come away, Miss Winifred dear,--come away, if you're a Christian at all, and not a fairy as some says."

Moira uttered an exclamation, and, darting over to Barney, dealt him a sounding slap on the ear.

"How dare you talk that way to Miss Winifred!" she cried.

"And how dare you slap Barney for repeating what foolish people say!" broke in Winifred. "I'm ashamed of you, Moira!"

She stood up as she spoke, confronting both the culprits. Barney's face was still red from the slap, as well as from a sense of the enormity he had committed in repeating to Miss Winifred what he supposed had been kept carefully from her. Moira's lip quivered at her young mistress's reproof, and she seemed on the point of crying; but Winifred spoke with exceeding gentleness.

"I'm sorry I was so hasty," she said; "but, you see, Barney spoke only for my good, and you should have had patience with him."

"And I ask your pardon for the words I said," Barney began, in confusion.

"You needn't, Barney," said Winifred. "You only told me what you hear every day." Then, turning to me, she added: "So you won't be surprised when I do anything strange. For, you see, I'm only a fairy, after all; and a mischievous one at times." Her face was all sparkling with smiles, and the very spirit of mischief looked out of her eyes. "I'll be laying spells on you to keep you here."

"I may be weaving a counter one to take you away," I ventured.

She looked a little startled, but went on in the same playful tone, as she turned back again to the bewildered boy and girl:

"I'll be enchanting the pair of you, so that you will be standing stock-still just where you are for a hundred years, staring before you."

At this they both took to their heels with a scream, Winifred in pursuit.

"And I'll turn Danny into a dragon and send him flying home with the turf."

There were muffled exclamations of terror from the flying pair.

"I think I'll make you into a goose, Barney, with a long neck, thrusting yourself into everybody's business; and Moira into a pool where you can swim."

"Och, och! but the child is temptin' Providence!" cried Moira, coming to a stand at some distance off. "Here in this place of all others; and close by the rath where the gentlefolks is listenin' to every word, and she makin' game of them to their faces!"

"Mebbe she _is_ a fairy, after all!" muttered Barney, under his breath; for he feared a repetition of Moira's prompt chastisement. But this time indeed he was beyond the reach of her arm, and Moira herself was in a less warlike mood. A sudden shadow, too, fell over the moon, so that we were in darkness. It was a cloud of intense blackness, which fell like a pall on the shining disc.

"See what comes of meddlin' with them you know!" cried Barney, while even Winifred was sobered; and the three crept toward the cart, Barney and Moira shivering with fright. Barney whipped up the unconscious horse, who had much relished his stay upon the bog, and was only urged into activity by the prospect of going home.

"Go now, then, Danny avick!" Barney whispered. "It's not bein' turned into a quare beast of some kind you'd wish to be. Get us away from here before the good people comes up out of the rath; for there's no tellin' what they'd do to us."

"Hear how he talks to the horse!" said Winifred, who was now seated again beside me, her curls dancing with the jolting of the cart. "As if Danny knew anything about the good people!"

"Oh, doesn't he, then, Miss Winifred!" cried Barney. "It's meself has seen him all of atremble from me whisperin' in his ear concernin' them."

"You just imagine it, Barney," said Winifred.

"And is it _I_ imagine it?" exclaimed Barney, aggrieved; while Moira sat in terrified silence, peering from side to side into the darkness as if she expected to see the avenging good people waiting for us along the road. We were nearly at the castle gate before Barney resumed anything of his former spirits and ventured on a joke or two. But Winifred was the merriest of the merry, and kept me laughing immoderately all along the moonlit way, as we jolted and jogged. She insisted that the cart wheels sang a song, and made up rhymes to the musical sounds which she pretended she could hear so plainly.

I often look back to that evening with peculiar pleasure. Winifred was at her best: most childlike, most natural, thoroughly enjoying every moment of the beautiful summer night; so that the doubt came over me whether it was better, after all, to remove her from this idyllic life amongst the Irish hills. The sober common-sense, however, of next morning confirmed me in my previous opinion, and I took the first step toward the realization of that design by seeking an interview with the schoolmaster.