“Now Clare Island comes into view,” she continued, and peeping out again I beheld the shoulder of the hill of Knockmore looming up, while beyond it lay a mass of islands, and still further away the mountains on the coast.
“All this,” said the maid with a sweep of her hand, “and the mainland beyond, is the Land of the O’Malleys.”
“And is the water also yours?” I asked, attempting a boy’s shy pleasantry, for so had she won me from my grief.
“Yes,” replied the maid, “the water even more than the land is ours.” And she looked—what she was, though but a little maid—the daughter of a king of the sea.
CHAPTER II.
THE PRINCESS BEGINS HER REIGN.
Ten years, swift as the flight of wild swans winging their way southward when the first wind of winter sweeps behind them, passed over our heads in the Land of the O’Malleys; nor did they pass without bringing many changes with them. And yet it so happened that no very startling or determining event occurred till at the very close of this period.
The little maid who had saved me from the sea had grown into a woman, tall of stature and queenly in carriage—in a word, a commanding figure, one to be obeyed, yet also one who had the gifts which made obedience to her pleasant and easy. Already she had proved herself in attack by sea or assault on shore a born leader, brave as the bravest man amongst us all, but with a mind of larger grasp than any of ours.
Yet were there times when she was as one who sees visions and feeds on fantasies; and I was ever afraid for her and us when I saw in her face the strange light shining through the veil of the flesh which spoke of the dreaming soul.