to the sea level, passes the most
conspicuous of the neighboring mountains, the Corkscrew Hill. The general
shape of the mountain is conical, the terraces composing it are of
wonderful regularity from the base to the peak, and the strata being
sharply upturned from the horizontal, the impression given is that of a
broad road carved out of the sides of the mountain and winding by an easy
ascent to the summit.

"'Tis the Pooka's Path they call it," said the car-man. "Phat's the Pooka?
Well, that's not aisy to say. It's an avil sper't that does be always in
mischief, but sure it niver does sarious harrum axceptin' to thim that
desarves it, or thim that shpakes av it disrespictful. I never seen it,
Glory be to God, but there's thim that has, and be the same token, they do
say that it looks like the finest black horse that iver wore shoes. But it
isn't a horse at all at all, for no horse 'ud have eyes av fire, or be
breathin' flames av blue wid a shmell o' sulfur, savin' yer presince, or a
shnort like thunder, and no mortial horse 'ud take the lapes it does, or
go as fur widout gettin' tired. Sure when it give Tim O'Bryan the ride it
give him, it wint from Gort to Athlone wid wan jump, an' the next it tuk
he was in Mullingyar, and the next was in Dublin, and back agin be way av
Kilkenny an' Limerick, an' niver turned a hair. How far is that? Faith I
dunno, but it's a power av distance, an' clane acrost Ireland an' back. He
knew it was the Pooka bekase it shpake to him like a Christian mortial,
only it isn't agrayble in its language an' 'ull niver give ye a dacint
word afther ye're on its back, an' sometimes not before aither.

"Sure Dennis O'Rourke was afther comin' home wan night, it was only a boy
I was, but I mind him tellin' the shtory, an' it was at a fair in Galway
he'd been. He'd been havin' a sup, some says more, but whin he come to the
rath, and jist beyant where the fairies dance and ferninst the wall where
the polisman was shot last winther, he fell in the ditch, quite spint and
tired complately. It wasn't the length as much as the wideness av the road
was in it, fur he was goin' from wan side to the other an' it was too much
fur him entirely. So he laid shtill fur a bit and thin thried fur to get
up, but his legs wor light and his head was heavy, an' whin he attimpted
to get his feet an the road 'twas his head that was an it, bekase his legs
cudn't balance it. Well, he laid there and was bet entirely, an' while h