Page:The Aran Islands, parts III and IV (Synge).djvu/59

 village got his gun one day and went out to look for rabbits in a thicket near the small dun. He saw a rabbit sitting up under a tree, and he lifted his gun to take aim at it, but just as he had it covered he heard a kind of music over his head, and he looked up into the sky. When he looked back for the rabbit, not a bit of it was to be seen.

He went on after that, and he heard the music again.

Then he looked over a wall, and he saw a rabbit sitting up by the wall with a sort of flute in its mouth, and it playing on it with its two fingers!

'What sort of a rabbit was that?' said the old woman when they had finished. 'How could that be a right rabbit? I remember old Pat Dirane used to be telling us he was once out on the cliffs, and he saw a big rabbit sitting down in a hole under a flagstone. He called a man who was with him, and they put a hook on the end of a stick and ran it down into the hole. Then a voice called up to them:

Ah, Phaddrick, don't hurt me with the hook!

'Pat was a great rogue,' said the old man. Maybe you remember the bits of horns he had like handles on the end of his sticks? Well,