Resolving to test the matter at once, with an effort of courage, he rose up gradually, and looked around him; all was quiet.
"If any thing will make them spake, the pipes will," said he, bravely, and so, filling his chanter, he gave one preliminary blast, and finding that it met with no response, save from the distant echoes, that sent it sweeping back in multiplied reverberations, he commenced to play one of his most lauded planxtys; never had he satisfied himself better, but never had he exerted himself before a more unappreciative assembly; the universal fun and frolic went on as before.
His artistic self-love was sadly wounded. "The divil such a lot of stupid fairies did I ever hear tell of," said he, throwing down his pipes in disgust. "An' bad luck attend the grunt more yez'll get out o' me; such elegant music as I've been threaten yez wid, an' the never an ear cocked among the lot of yez."
"A thin, Misther Terry Magra," said the smallest possible kind of a voice, but which thrilled through the piper as though it were thunder-loud. "Shure, an' you're not goin' to concate that it's music you've been tearin' out ov them tree-stumps of yours; be the powers of war, it's a tom-cat I thought you wor squeezin' undher yer arms."
"Thank you, kindly, yer honor, for the compliment, whoever you are," replied Terry, when, on turning round to the quarter from whence the voice proceeded, he saw, sitting on the branch of a tree beside him, a diminutive piper, in all respects a perfect resemblance to himself; dressed in similar garments, even to the dilapidated caubieen, with an atom of a dhudieen stuck in it; but what elicited his admiration most of all, was the weeny set of pipes the swaggering little ruffian carried on his arm.
"Your soul to glory," cried Terry, his excitement completely mastering his apprehension. "An' if you can blow any music out of them, I'll give in soon an' suddent."
"Howld yer prate, you ugly man, an' bad Christian," cried the little fellow; "sure, an' it's plinty of help I'll have;" with that, he put the bellows under his arm, and blew a blast that sounded like the whistle of a tom-tit in distress; a signal which was quickly answered by similar sounds, issuing from all directions; and very soon Terry saw groups of little pipers climbing up the tree until the branch was fairly alive with them, each one an exact counterpart of the first.
"May I never sin if the sowls of all the Terry Magras, past, present, an' to come, ain't to the fore, it's my belief, this minnit," said the piper, in an ecstasy of amazement.
"We must graize our elbows before we begin, boys," said Terry's friend, producing a fairy bottle.
"Here's your health, Misther Terry Magra," says the little vagabond, with a ghost of a laugh; and up went the bottle to his head.