Well, he got there, and found the bridge without much difficulty. Every day he walked up and down looking for the crock of gold, but never the find did he find it. One day, however, as he was looking over the bridge into the water, a man, or something like a man, with great black whiskers, like a Hessian, and a black cloak that reached down to the ground, taps him on the shoulder, and says he—“Tim Jarvis, do you see me?”
“Surely I do, sir,” said Tim; wondering that any body should know him in that strange place.
“Tim,” says he, “what is it brings you here in foreign parts, so far away from your own cabin by the mine of gray copper at Balledehob?”
“Please your honour,” says Tim, “I’m come to seek my fortune.”
“You’re a fool for your pains, Tim, if that’s all,” remarked the stranger in the black cloak; “this is a big place to seek one’s fortune in, to be sure, but it’s not so easy to find it.”
Now Tim, after debating a long time with himself, and considering, in the first place, that it might be the stranger who was to find the crock of gold for him; and in the next, that the stranger might direct him where to find it, came to the resolution of telling him all.
“There’s many a one like me comes here seeking their fortunes,” said Tim.
“True,” said the stranger.
“But,” continued Tim, looking up, “the body and bones of the cause for myself leaving the woman, and Nelly, and the boys, and travelling so far, is to look for a crock of gold that I’m told is lying somewhere hereabouts.”