When I reached the place where the figures were seated, the two men still held me firmly, and some others threw some handfuls of dry fuel upon the red embers, which, blazing up, cast a strong light upon me.
When they had satisfied themselves as to my appearance, they began to question me very closely as to my purpose in being upon the hill at such an unseasonable hour, asking me what was my occupation, where I had been, and whither I was going.
These questions were put to me in English by an old half-military looking man, who translated into that language the suggestions which his companions for the most part threw out in Irish.
I did not choose to commit myself to these fellows by telling them my real character and purpose, and therefore I represented myself as a poor travelling chapman who had been at Cork, and was seeking his way to Killaloe, in order to cross over into Clare and thence to the city of Galway.
My account did not seem fully to satisfy the men.
I heard one fellow say in Irish, which language I understood, 'Maybe he is a spy.'
They then whispered together for a time, and the little man who was their spokesman came over to me and said:
'Do you know what we do with spies? we knock their brains out, my friend.'
He then turned back to them with whom he had been whispering, and talked in a low tone again with them for a considerable time.
I now felt very uncomfortable, not knowing what these savages—for they appeared nothing better—might design against me.