While disaster and hubbub were rife below, the electors up-stairs were holding a council whether it would not be better to send back the “Honourable's” messenger to the town and request a supply of shoes, which they had no other means of getting. The debate was of an odd sort; they were all in their several beds at the time, and roared at each other through their doors, which were purposely left open that they might enjoy each other's conversation; number seven replied to number three, and claimed respect to his arguments on the score of seniority; the blue room was completely controverted by the yellow; and the double-bedded room would, of course, have had superior weight in the argument, only that everything it said was lost by the two honourable members speaking together. The French king used to hold a council called a “bed of justice,” in which neither justice nor a bed had anything to do, so that this Irish conference better deserved the title than any council the Bourbon ever assembled. The debate having concluded, and the question being put and carried, the usher of the black counterpane was desired to get out of bed, and, wrapped in the robe of office whence he derived his title, to go down-stairs and call the “Honourable's” messenger to the “bar of the house,” and there order him a pint of porter, for refreshment after his ride; and forthwith to send him back again to the town for a supply of shoes.

The house was unanimous in voting the supplies. The usher reached the kitchen and found Andy in his shirt sleeves, scraping the dripping from his livery with an old knife, whose hackled edge considerably assisted Andy's own ingenuity in the tearing of his coat in many places, while the little man made no effort towards the repair of his garment, but held it up before him, and regarded it with a piteous look.

To the usher of the black counterpane's question, whether Andy was the “Honourable's messenger,” Andy replied in the affirmative; but to the desire expressed, that he would ride back to the town, Andy returned a decided negative.

“My ordhers is not to go back without you,” said Andy.

“But we have no shoes,” said the usher; “and cannot go until we get some.”

“My ordher is not to go back without you.”

“But if we can't go?”

“Well, then, I can't go back, that's all,” said Andy.

The usher, the landlord, and the landlady all hammered away at Andy for a long time, in vain trying to convince him he ought to return, as he was desired; still Andy stuck to the letter of his orders, and said he often got into trouble for not doing exactly what he was bid, and that he was bid “not to go back without them, and he would not—so he wouldn't—divil a fut.”

At last, however, Andy was made to understand the propriety of riding back to the town; and was desired to go as fast as his horse could carry him, to gallop every foot of the way; but Andy did no such thing; he had received a good thrashing once for being caught galloping his master's horse on the road, and he had no intention of running the risk a second time, because “the stranger” told him to do so. “What does he know about it?” said Andy to himself; “'faith, it's fair and aisy I'll go, and not disthress the horse to plaze any one.” So he went back his ten miles at a reasonable pace only; and when he appeared without the electors, a storm burst on poor Andy.

“There! I knew how it would be,” said he, “and not my fault at all.”

“Weren't you told not to return without them?”

“But wait till I tell you how it was, sure;” and then Andy began an account of the condition in which the voters lay at the inn but between the impatience of those who heard, and the confused manner of Andy's recital, it was some time before matters were explained; and then Andy was desired to ride back to the inn again, to tell the electors shoes should be forwarded after him in a post-chaise, and requesting their utmost exertions in hastening over to the town, for that the election was going against them. Andy returned to the inn; and this time, under orders from head quarters, galloped in good earnest, and brought in his horse smoking hot, and indicating lameness. The day was wearing apace, and it was so late when the electors were enabled to start that the polling-booths were closed before they could leave the town; and in many of these booths the requisite number of electors had not been polled that day to keep them open; so that the next day nearly all those outlying electors, about whom there had been so much trouble and expense, would be of no avail. Thus, Murphy's trick was quite successful, and the poor pickled electors were driven back to their inn in dudgeon.

Andy, when he went to the stable to saddle his steed, for a return to Neck-or-Nothing Hall, found him dead lame, so that to ride him better than twelve miles home was impossible. Andy was obliged to leave him where he was, and trudge it to the hall; for all the horses in Kelly's stables were knocked up with their day's work.

As it was shorter by four miles across the country than by the road, Andy pursued the former course; and as he knew the country well, the shades of evening, which were now closing round, did not deter him in the least. Andy was not very fresh for the journey to be sure, for he had ridden upwards of thirty miles that day, so the merry whistle, which is so constantly heard from the lively Irish pedestrian, did not while away the tedium of his walk. It was night when Andy was breasting up a low ridge of hills, which lay between him and the end of his journey; and when in silence and darkness he topped the ascent, he threw himself on some heather to rest and take breath. His attention was suddenly caught by a small blue flame, which flickered now and then on the face of the hill, not very far from him; and Andy's fears of fairies and goblins came crowding upon him thick and fast. He wished to rise, but could not; his eye continued to be strained with the fascination of fear in the direction he saw the fire, and sought to pierce the gloom through which, at intervals, the small point of flame flashed brightly and sunk again, making the darkness seem deeper. Andy lay in perfect stillness, and in the silence, which was unbroken even by his own breathing, he thought he heard voices underground. He trembled from head to foot, for he was certain they were the voices of the fairies, whom he firmly believed to inhabit the hills.

“Oh! murdher, what'll I do?” thought Andy to himself: “sure I heerd often, if once you were within the sound of their voices, you could never get out o' their power. Oh! if I could only say a pather and ave, but I forget my prayers with the fright. Hail, Mary! The king o' the fairies lives in these hills, I know—and his house is undher me this minit, and I on the roof of it—I'll never get down again—I'll never get down again—they'll make me slater to the fairies; and sure enough I remember me, the hill is all covered with flat stones they call fairy slates. Oh! I am ruined—God be praised!” Here he blessed himself, and laid his head close to the earth. “Guardian angels—I hear their voices singin' a dhrinking song—Oh! if I had a dhrop o' water myself, for my mouth is as dhry as a lime-burner's wig—and I on the top o' their house—see—there's the little blaze again—I wondher is their chimbley afire—Oh! murther, I'll die o' thirst—Oh! if I had only one dhrop o' wather—I wish it would rain or hail—Hail, Mary, full o' grace—whisht! what's that?” Andy crouched lower than before, as he saw a figure rise from the earth, and attain a height which Andy computed to be something about twenty feet; his heart shrank to the size of a nut-shell, as he beheld the monster expand to his full dimensions; and at the same moment, a second, equally large, emerged from the ground.

Now, as fairies are notoriously little people, Andy changed his opinion of the parties into whose power he had fallen, and saw clearly they were giants, not fairies, of whom he was about to become the victim. He would have ejaculated a prayer for mercy, had not terror rendered him speechless, as the remembrance of all the giants he had ever heard of, from the days of Jack and the Bean-stalk down, came into his head; but though his sense of speaking was gone, that of hearing was painfully acute, and he heard one of the giants say—

“That pot is not big enough.”

“Oh! it howlds as much as we want,” replied the other.

“O Lord,” thought Andy; “they've got their pot ready for cooking.”

“What keeps him?” said the first giant.

“Oh! he's not far off,” said the second.

A clammy shivering came over Andy.

“I'm hungry,” said the first, and he hiccupped as he spoke.

“It's only a false appetite you have,” said the second, “you're drunk.”

This was a new light to Andy, for he thought giants were too strong to get drunk. “I could ate a young child, without parsley and butther,” said the drunken giant. Andy gave a faint spasmodic kick.

“And it's as hot as —— down there,” said the giant.

Andy trembled at the horrid word he heard.

“No wonder,” said the second giant; “for I can see the flame popping out at the top of the chimbley; that's bad: I hope no one will see it, or it might give them warning. Bad luck to that young divil for making the fire so sthrong.”

What a dreadful hearing this was for Andy: young devils to make their fires; there was no doubt what place they were dwelling in. “Thunder and turf!” said the drunken giant; “I wish I had a slice of—”

Andy did not hear what he wished a slice of, for the night wind swept across the heath at the moment, and carried away the monster's disgusting words on its pure breath.

“Well, I'd rather have—” said the other giant; and again Andy lost what his atrocious desires were—“than all the other slices in the world. What a lovely round shoulder she has, and the nice round ankle of her—”

The word “ankle” showed at once it was a woman of whom he spoke, and Andy shuddered. “The monsters! to eat a woman.”

“What a fool you are to be in love,” said the drunken giant with several hiccups, showing the increase of his inebriation.

“Is that what the brutes call love,” thought Andy, “to ate a woman?”

“I wish she was bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh,” said the second giant. Of this speech Andy heard only “bone” and “flesh,” and had great difficulty in maintaining the serenity of his diaphragm.

The conversation of the giants was now more frequently interrupted by the wind which was rising, and only broken sentences reached Andy, whose senses became clearer the longer he remained in a state of safety; at last he heard the name of Squire Egan distinctly pass between the giants.

“So they know Squire Egan,” thought Andy.

The first giant gave a drunken laugh at the mention of Squire Egan's name, and exclaimed—

“Don't be afraid of him (hiccup); I have him undher my thumb (hiccup). I can crush him when I plase.”

“O! my poor owld masther!” mentally ejaculated Andy.

Another break in their conversation occurred, and the next name Andy overheard was “O'Grady.”

“The big bully!” said the second giant.

“They know the whole country,” thought Andy.

“But tell me, what was that you said to him at the election?” said the drunken one.

The word “election” recalled Andy to the business of this earth back again; and it struck upon his hitherto bewildered sensorium that giants could have nothing to do with elections, and he knew he never saw them there; and, as the thought struck him, it seemed as if the giants diminished in size, and did not appear quite so big.

“Sure you know,” said the second.

“Well, I'd like to hear it again,” said the drunken one (hiccup).

“The big bully says to me, 'Have you a lease?' says he; 'No,' says I; 'but I have an article!' 'What article?' says he; 'It's a fine brass blunderbuss,' says I, 'and I'd like to see the man would dispute the title!'”

The drunken listener chuckled, and the words broke the spell of supernatural terror which had hung over Andy; he knew, by the words of the speaker, it was the bully joker of the election was present, who browbeat O'Grady and out-quibbled the agent about the oath of allegiance; and the voice of the other he soon recognised for that of Larry Hogan. So now his giants were diminished into mortal men—the pot, which had been mentioned to the terror of his soul, was for the making of whisky instead of human broth—and the “hell” he thought his giants inhabited was but a private still. Andy felt as if a mountain had been lifted from his heart when he found it was but mortals he had to deal with; for Andy was not deficient in courage when it was but thews and sinews like his own he had to encounter. He still lay concealed, however, for smugglers might not wish their private haunt to be discovered, and it was possible Andy would be voted one too many in the company should he announce himself; and with such odds as two to one against him he thought he had better be quiet. Besides, his curiosity became excited when he found them speaking of his old master, Egan, and his present one, O'Grady; and as a woman had been alluded to, and odd words caught up here and there, he became anxious to hear more of their conversation.

“So you're in love,” said Larry, with a hiccup, to our friend of the blunderbuss; “ha! ha! ha! you big fool.”

“Well, you old thief, don't you like a purty girl yourself?”

“I did, when I was young and foolish.”

“'Faith, then, you're young and foolish at that rate yet, for you're a rogue with the girls, Larry,” said the other, giving him a slap on the back.

“Not I! not I!” said Larry, in a manner expressive of his not being displeased with the charge of gallantry; “he! he! he!—how do you know, eh?” (Hiccup.) “Sure, I know myself; but as I wos telling you, if I could only lay howld of—” here his voice became inaudible to Andy, and the rest of the sentence was lost.

Andy's curiosity was great. “Who could the girl be?”

“And you'd carry her off?” said Larry.

“I would,” said the other; “I'm only afraid o' Squire Egan.”

At this announcement of the intention of “carrying her off,” coupled with the fear of “Squire Egan,” Andy's anxiety to hear the name of the person became so intense that he crawled cautiously a little nearer to the speakers.

“I tell you again,” said Larry, “I can settle him aisy (hiccup)—he's undher my thumb (hiccup).”

“Be aisy,” said the other, contemptuously, who thought this was a mere drunken delusion of Larry's.

“I tell you I'm his masther!” said Larry, with a drunken flourish of his arm; and he continued bragging of his power over the Squire in various ejaculations, the exact meaning of which our friend of the blunderbuss could not fathom, but Andy heard enough to show him that the discovery of the post-office affair was what Larry alluded to.

That Larry, a close, cunning, circumventing rascal, should so far betray the source of his power over Egan may seem strange; but be it remembered Larry was drunk, a state of weakness which his caution generally guarded him from falling into, but which being in, his foible was bragging of his influence, and so running the risk of losing it.

The men continued to talk together for some time, and the tenour of the conversation was, that Larry assured his companion he might carry off the girl without fear of Egan, but her name Andy could not discover. His own name he heard more than once, and voluptuous raptures poured forth about lovely lips and hips and ankles from the herculean knight of the blunderbuss, amidst the maudlin admiration and hiccups of Larry, who continued to brag of his power, and profess his readiness to stand by his friend in carrying off the girl.

“Then,” said the Hercules, with an oath, “I'll soon have you in my arms, my lovely—”

The name was lost again.

Their colloquy was now interrupted by the approach of a man and woman, the former being the person for whose appearance Larry made so many inquiries when he first appeared to Andy as the hungry giant; the other was the sister of the knight of the blunderbuss. Larry having hiccupped his anger against the man for making them wait so long for the bacon, the woman said he should not wait longer without his supper now, for that she would go down and fry the rashers immediately. She then disappeared through the ground, and the men all followed.

Andy drew his breath freely once more, and with caution raised himself gradually from the ground with a careful circumspection, lest any of the subterranean community might be watchers on the hill; and when he was satisfied he was free from observation, he stole away from the spot with stealthy steps for about twenty paces, and there, as well as the darkness would permit, after taking such landmarks as would help him to retrace his way to the still, if requisite, he dashed down the hill at the top of his speed. This pace he did not moderate until he had placed nearly a mile between him and the scene of his adventure; he then paced slowly to regain his breath. His head was in a strange whirl; mischief was threatened against some one of whose name he was ignorant; Squire Egan was declared to be in the power of an old rascal; this grieved Andy most of all, for he felt he was the cause of his old master's dilemma.

“Oh! to think I should bring him into trouble,” said Andy, “the kind and good masther he was to me ever, and I live to tell it like a blackguard—throth I'd rather be hanged any day than the masther would come to throuble—maybe if I gave myself up and was hanged like a man at once, that would settle it; 'faith, if I thought it would, I'd do it sooner than Squire Egan should come to throuble!” and poor Andy spoke just what he felt. “Or would it do to kill that blackguard Hogan? sure they could do no more than hang me afther, and that would save the masther, and be all one to me, for they often towld me I'd be hanged. But then there's my sowl,” said Andy, and he paused at the thought—, “if they hanged me for the letthers, it would be only for a mistake, and sure then I'd have a chance o' glory; for sure I might go to glory through a mistake; but if I killed a man on purpose, sure it would be slappin' the gates of Heaven in my own face. Faix, I'll spake to Father Blake about it.”

[Footnote: How often has the sanguinary penal code of past years suggested this reflection and provoked the guilt it was meant to awe! Happily, now our laws are milder, and more protective from their mildness.]

[Footnote: In the foregoing passage, Andy stumbles on uttering a quaint pleasantry, for it is partly true as well as droll—the notion of a man gaining Paradise through a mistake. Our intentions too seldom lead us there, but rather tend the other way, for a certain place is said to be paved with “good” ones, and surely “bad” ones would not lead us upwards. Then the phrase of a man “slapping the gates of Heaven in his own face,” is one of those wild poetic figures of speech in which the Irish peasantry often indulge. The phrase “slapping the door” is every-day and common; but when applied to “the gates of Heaven,” and “in a man's own face,” the common phrase becomes fine. But how often the commonest things become poetry by the fitness of their application, though poetasters and people of small minds think greatness of thought lies in big words.]