ack agin when he seen the saint at the dure av the cave.
An' thin he begun a peckin' away at the clift fur dear life, shwearin' to
himself, so the saint cudn't hear him, every time he give his knuckles an
onlucky crack wid the hammer.

"'Ye're not worth the throuble,' says he to Lord Robert; he was that full
av rage he cudn't howld in. 'It's a paltherin' gossoon I was fur thriflin'
wid ye whin I was sure av ye annyhow.'

"'Yer a liar,' says Lord Robert, 'ye desaivin' nagurly Haythen. If ye was
sure o' me phat did ye want to make a bargain fur?'

"'Yer another,' says Satan. 'Isn't a sparrer in yer hand betther than a
goose on a shtring?'

"So they were goin' on wid the blaggardin' match, whin the blessed saint,
that come out whin he heard thim begin, an' thin set on the dure
a-watchin', to see that owld Nick didn't schamp the job, interfared.

"'Howld yer pace, Satan, an' kape at yer work,' says he. 'An' for you, ye
blatherin', milk-faced villin, wid the heart as black as a crow, walk aff
wid ye an' go down on yer hard-hearted onbelavin' knees, or it's no good
'ull come o' ye.' An' so he did.

"Do I belave the shtory? Troth, I dunno. It's quare things happened in
them owld days, an' there's the face on the clift as ugly as the divil cud
be an' the hammer an' chisel are in the church an' phat betther proof cud
ye ax?

"Phat come av the lovers? No more do I know that, barrin' they grew owld
an' shtayed poor an' forgot the shpring-time av youth in the winter av
age, but if they lived a hunderd years, they niver forgot the marryin' in
the saint's cave, wid the black face av the Avil Wan lookin' on from the
dark corner."

[Illustration: "'Kape from me,' says the divil"]

THE DEFEAT OF THE WIDOWS.

[Illustration: Initial: "The Defeat of the Widows"]

When superstitions have not yet been banished from any other part of the
world it is not wonderful that they should still be found in the country
districts of Ireland, rural life being especially favorable to the
perpetuation of old ways of living and modes of thought, since in an
agricultural district less change takes place in a century than may, in a
city, be observed in a single decade. Country people preserve their old
legends with their antique styles of apparel, and thus the relics of the
pagan ages of Ireland have come down from father to son, altered and
adapted to the changes in the country and its population. Thus, for
instan