Page:Lippincotts Monthly Magazine-34.djvu/603

1884.] come to Muckross Gate, an' there we found all in bed, an' the ould woman at the lodge hard enough to rouse. By dint of yellin' an' throwin' stones at her windy I brought her out at last. She opened the shutther an inch or so, an' says she, 'Who's there?' 'A frind,' says I, as bowld as brass. 'A frind? The divil!' says she, screechin' it out like mad. An' would ye believe, ma'am, the ould varmint left us to climb the gates at that hour, swearin' to us all the time she'd report us to Herbert o' Muckross an' git the law of us."

"I hope there won't be a fog tonight," says Carrie, laughing.

"Oh, no, ma'am," says he, with a twinkle in his gray-blue eyes. "They've manners enough, thim fogs, to know when they shouldn't come on."

Tis a wonderful land," says Jones to me in a fat whisper.

"There's the Divil's Bit, ma'am," says James,—"that great rock there in the middle o' the lake. Ye'll see where he tuk it out o' if ye look up at Tore for a second."

We all glance at beautiful Tore, with its darkly-wooded sides, and mark where, on part of its topmost ridge, there is a hollow that looks as though a piece had been bitten out.

Twas the ould gintleman himself and The O'Donoghue as had a bet on it, ma'am, as to who could carry that stone widout droppin' it from Tore to Boss Island. An' the divil said he was equal to it, an' his price for carryin' it was to be The O'Donoghue's sowl, for he'd a great hankerin' afther him; an' though they were the best o' frinds, still The O'Donoghue held his own wid him, an' gave him no chance to git a hoult o' his spirit. Well, The O'Donoghue agreed to risk his sowl, an' the divil in great glee bit the stone out o' the mountain and flew toward Ross. But, fegs, it was too much for him, the ould blagguard, an' half-way across the lake it slipped from him and dhropped jist where ye see it now. An' 'twas mighty fine game The O'Donoghue made o' him afther that."

We have crossed the lake by this time and come to Toothache Bridge, which leads from the Middle Lake to The Meeting of the Waters.

"An', indeed, ma'am, an' 'tis no lie for me, once ye pass undher that bridge ye'll never have toothache ag'in," says James, with solemn belief.

And now we pass under the old Weir Bridge, and enter on the beautiful channel of running water called the Long Bange, that leads to the Upper Lake. Shadowed by wild Tore, grand and majestic, we steal down this heavenly stream, our senses filled with the silent beauty of its verdant banks. Here and there on every side rises peak above peak in the great walls of hills that line our way on right and left. There is a strange stillness in the air, a marvellous light on all things, unknown to other lovely scenes. There is no sound anywhere save the harmonious rippling of the water against the sides of our boat.

And now we are gliding past the Eagle's Nest, a tapering mountain, and James, resting on his oars, sends forth a wild, musical cry, that is caught up by a splendid echo and rung through many changes until it dies away into a sobbing silence. Then somebody remembers the "coo-ee" of the Australian colonists, and we call it aloud, and find it has a wonderful effect among these hills; and so we teach it to James, and hope that in the future he will make use of it with other visitors, and so have something of his own to give them unknown to the boatmen round.

Then on again, by our wave-girt shore, past fantastic rocks and gleaming water-weeds and wet green grasses, to Coleman's Eye, a promontory, which shows we have come to the end of the Long Range and are entering the Upper Lake.

Of all three lakes surely it is the loveliest, with its fairy isles and grand old mountains, its tranquil, lonely calm, and its glimpse of the Black Valley far away in the distance. Down the sides of the mountains run little rills, pale and bright as silver beneath the sun's hot rays. Tall pine-trees, dark and solemn, crowd to the water's edge; some swans, with proud arched necks and spotless