“What! not about the beautiful island, and the mighty mountains, and the goold, and the jewels, and the big turtle and all?”
“No, Rory, never a word.”
“Well, then, to begin with, it’s ten years ago, and maybe a bit more, so I wasn’t so old as I am now. I hadn’t been more’n a year or two at sea, and mostly coasting that same would be, though sure enough my great ambition was to sail away beyond the sunrise, or away to the back av the north wind and seek me fortune. It was living at home in ould Oirland I was then, with mother and Molly—the saints be around them this noight!—and a swater, claner, tidier bit av a lass than me sister Molly there doesn’t live ’tween here and Tralee, and sure that is the only bit av real truth in the whole av me story.”
“We perfectly believe that, Rory.”
“Well thin, boys, it was crossing the bog I was one beautiful moonlight night about five o’clock in the morning, and a big wild bog it was, too, with never a house nor a cot in it, and nobody at all barrin’ the moor-snipes and the kelpies, when all at once, what or who should I see standing right foreninst me, beside a rick av peats, but a gentleman in sailor’s clothes, with gold all round his hat, and a bunch av seals dangling in front av him as big as turkey’s eggs. And sure it wasn’t shy he was at spaking either, boys.
“‘The top av the mornin’ to ye,’ says he.
“‘The same to you,’ says I, quite bold-like, though my heart felt as big as peat; ‘the same to you and a thousand av them.’
“‘Is it poor or rich ye are?’ says he.
“‘As poor as a peat creel,’ says I.
“‘Then sure,’ says he, ‘I daresay it isn’t sorry to make your fortune you’d be.’