s were in it that
day.'

It need hardly be said that in all tramp life plaintive and tragic
elements are common, even on the surface. Some are peculiar to
Wicklow. In these hills the summer passes in a few weeks from a late
spring, full of odour and colour, to an autumn that is premature and
filled with the desolate splendour of decay; and it often happens
that, in moments when one is most aware of this ceaseless fading of
beauty, some incident of tramp life gives a local human intensity to
the shadow of one's own mood.

One evening, on the high ground near the Avonbeg, I met a young
tramp just as an extraordinary sunset had begun to fade, and a low
white mist was rising from the bogs. He had a sort of table in his
hands that he seemed to have made himself out of twisted rushes and
a few branches of osier. His clothes were more than usually ragged,
and I could see by his face that he was suffering from some terrible
disease. When he was quite close, he held out the table.

'Would you give me a few pence for that thing?' he said. 'I'm after
working at it all day by the river, and for the love of God give me
something now, the way I can get a drink and lodging for the night.'

I felt in my pockets, and could find nothing but a shilling piece.

'I wouldn't wish to give you so much,' I said, holding it out to
him, 'but it is all I have, and I don't like to give you nothing at
all, and the darkness coming on. Keep the table; it's no use to me,
and you'll maybe sell it for something in the morning.'

The shilling was more than he expected, and his eyes flamed with
joy.

'May the Almighty God preserve you and watch over you and reward you
for this night,' he said, 'but you'll take the table; I wouldn't
keep it at all, and you after stretching out your hand with a
shilling to me, and the darkness coming on.'

He forced it into my hands so eagerly that I could not refuse it,
and set off down the road with tottering steps. When he had gone a
few yards, I called after him: 'There's your table; take it and God
speed you.'

Then I put down his table on the ground, and set off as quickly as I
was able. In a moment he came up with me, holding the table in his
hands, and slipped round in front of me so that I could not get
away.

'You wouldn't refuse it,' he said, 'and I after working at it all
day below by the river.'

He was shaking with excitement and the exertion of overtaking me; so
I took his table and let him go