One night a middle-aged man, who had lived all his life far from the noise of cab-wheels, a young girl, a relation of his, who was reported to be enough of a seer to catch a glimpse of unatable lights moving over the fields among the cattle, and myself, were walking along a far western sandy shore. We talked of the Fetful People as the faery people are sometimes called, and came in the midst of our talk to a notable haunt of theirs, a shallow cave amidst black rocks, with its refle u i sea sand. I asked the young girl if she could see anything, for I had quite a number of things to ask the Fetful People. She stood still for a few minutes, and I saw that she assing into a kind of waking trance, in which the cold sea breeze no loroubled her, nor the dull boom of the sea distracted her attention. I then called aloud the names of the great faeries, and in a moment or two she said that she could hear music far ihe rocks, and then a sound of fused talking, and of people stamping their feet as if to applaud some unseen performer. Up to this my other friend had been walking to and fro some yards off, but now he passed close to us, and as he did so said suddenly that we were going to be interrupted, for he heard the laughter of children somewhere beyond the rocks. We were, however, quite alohe spirits of the place had begun to cast their influence over him also. In a moment he was corroborated by the girl, who said that bursts of laughter had begun to mih the music, the fused talking, and the noise of feet. She saw a bright light streaming out of the cave, which seemed to have grown much deeper, and a quantity of little people, in various coloured dresses, red predominating, dang to a tune which she did nnize.
The people and faeries in Ireland are sometimes as big as we are, sometimes bigger, and sometimes, as I have been told, about three feet high. The Old Mayo woman I so often quote, thinks that it is something in our eyes that makes them seem big or little.
I then bade her call out to the queen of the little people to e and talk with us. There was, however, no ao her and. I therefore repeated the words aloud myself, and in a moment a very beautiful tall woman came out of the cave. I too had by this time fallen into a kind of trance, in which what we call the unreal had begun to take upon itself a masterful reality, and was able to see the faint gleam of golden ors, the shadowy blossom of dim hair. I then bade the girl tell this tall queen to marshal her followers acc to their natural divisions, that we might see them.
I found as before that I had to repeat the and myself. The creatures then came out of the cave, and drew themselves up, if I remember rightly, in four bands. One of these bands carried qui boughs in their hands, and another had necklaces made apparently of serpents』 scales, but their dress I ot remember, for I was quite absorbed in that gleaming woman. I asked her to tell the seer whether these caves were the greatest faery haunts in the neighbourhood. Her lips moved, but the answer was inaudible. I bade the seer lay her hand upon the breast of the queen, and after that she heard every word quite distinctly. No, this was not the greatest faery haunt, for there was a greater one a little further ahead. I then asked her whether it was true that she and her people carried away mortals, and if so, whether they put another soul in the place of the ohey had taken?
「We ge the bodies,」 was her answer. 「Are