ord.

For a little while, too, the old woman said not a word. She sat with
her eyes closed, and smiling, as if she were in a dream. Then she
began to speak softly, as if she were still only just waking out of a
dream. "Blessed days there were," she said--"blessed days for Ireland
once--long ago--many hundreds of years. O'Donoghue--it was he was the
good King, and happy were his people. A fierce warrior he was to guard
them from their enemies, and a just ruler to those who minded his
laws. It was in the West that he ruled, by the beautiful Lakes of
Killarney. The rich and the poor among his people were alike in one
thing--they all had justice. He punished even his own son when he did
wrong, as if he had been a poor man and a stranger.

"He gave grand feasts to his friends, and the greatest and the best
men of all Erin came to sit at his table and to hear the wise words
that he spoke. And the greatest bards of all Erin came to sing before
him and his guests of the brave deeds of the heroes of old days and of
the greatness and the goodness of O'Donoghue himself. At one of these
feasts, after a bard had been singing of the noble days of Erin long
ago, O'Donoghue began to speak of the years that were to come for
Ireland. He told of much good and of much evil. He told how true and
brave and noble men would live and work and fight and die for their
country, and how cowards would betray her. He told of glory and he
told of shame. He spoke of riches and honor, and poetry and beauty; he
spoke of want and disgrace, and degradation and sorrow.

"Those who sat at his table listened to him in wonder. Sometimes their
hearts swelled with pride at the noble lives and deeds of those who
were to come after them, sometimes they wept at the sufferings that
their children were to feel, and sometimes they hid their faces from
each other in shame at the tales of cowardice and of treachery.

[Illustration: "'BLESSED DAYS THERE WERE,' SHE SAID."]

"As he finished speaking he rose from the table, crossed the hall,
and walked out at the door and down to the shore of the lake. The
others followed him and watched him, full of wonder. They saw him go
to the edge of the lake and then walk out upon it, as if the water had
been firm ground under his feet. He walked far and far out on the
bright lake as they stood and gazed at him. Then he turned toward
them, he waved his hand in farewell, and he was gone. They saw him no
more."

The old woman pau