ut. Come! set to.'

I took the Gypsy's advice, made as hearty a breakfast as I could, and
we left Llanberis in the light of morning. It was not till we had
reached and passed a place called Gwastadnant Gate that the path
along which we went became really wild and difficult. The Gypsy
seemed to know every inch of the country.

We reached a beautiful lake, where Sinfi stopped, and I began to
question her as to what was to be our route.

'Winnie know'd,' said she, 'some Welsh folk as fish in this 'ere
lake. She might ha' called 'em to mind, poor thing, and come off
here. I'm a-goin' to ask about her.'

Sinfi's inquiries here--her inquiries everywhere that day--ended in
nothing but blank and cruel disappointment.

Remembering that Winifred's very earliest childhood was passed near
Carnarvon, I proposed to the Gypsy that we should go thither at once.

After sleeping again at Llanberis, we went to Carnarvon, but soon
returned to the other side of Snowdon, for at Carnarvon we could find
no trace of her.

'Oh, Sinfi,' I said; as we stood watching the peculiar bright yellow
trout in Lake Ogwen, 'she is starving--starving on the hills--while
millions of people are eating, gorging, wasting food. I shall go
mad!'

Sinfi looked at me mournfully, and said:

'It's a bad job, reia, but if poor Winnie Wynne's a-starvin' it ain't
the fault o' them as happens to ha' got the full belly. There ain't a
Romany in Wales, nor there ain't a Gorgio nuther, as wouldn't give
Winnie a crust, if wonst we could find her.'

'To think of this great, rich world,' I exclaimed (to myself, not to
the Gypsy), 'choke-full of harvest, bursting with grain, while
famishing on the hills for a mouthful is she--the one!'

'Reia,' said Sinfi, with much solemnity, 'the world's full o'
vittles; what's wanted is jist a hand as can put the vittles and the
mouths where they ought to be--cluss togither. That's what the hungry
Romany says when he snares a hare or a rabbit.'

We walked on. After a while Sinfi said: 'A Romany knows more o' these
here kinds o' things, reia, than a Gorgio does. It's my belief as
Winnie Wynne ain't a-starvin' on the hills; she ain't got to starve;
she's on'y got to beg her bread. She'll have to do that, of course;
but beggin' ain't so bad as starvin', after all! There's some as begs
for the love on it. Videy does.'

I knew by this time that it was useless to battle against Sinfi's
conviction that the curse would have to be lite