“‘Yes,’ said my grand-dad.
“When it was finished, they lay down with their feet towards the grateful blaze, and in a moment or two were once more sound asleep.
“When they awoke what a change! All was light and beauty. They were in a cave with a river rolling silently at their feet away out and joining the blue sea. Yonder it was, and the sky, too, and white fleecy clouds, and screaming sea-birds, and the glorious sun itself.
“They understood all now. They had come to the end of the river while the tide was up; it was now ebb, and they were free.
“They rushed out wild with delight, and wandered away along the sea-beach. It was weeks and weeks before they managed to attract the notice of a passing vessel, and their adventures on shore were many and strange, but I must not tell them now, for it is time to turn in.
“But I believe you know, and so did my grand-dad, that they had been actually in the home of the great sea-serpent, that he dwells in mysterious subterranean rivers like these, venturing out to sea but seldom, and hardly ever appearing on the surface.”
“Are you done?” said one sailor.
“I’m done.”
“Well,” said Rory O’Reilly, “it’s a quare story, a very quare story, deed and indeed. But I can’t be after swallowing the big sarpint.”
