Out he sprang through the window, and she followed him, till they came to the “Green Hills,” and then says he:

“Open, open, Green Hills and let the light of the Green Hills through.”
“Aye,” says the girl, “and let the fair maid too.”

hey opened, and the man and woman passed through, and there they were on the edge of a bog.

He trod lightly over the shaky bits of moss and sod; and while she was thinking of how she’d get across, the old beggar appeared to her, but much nicer dressed, touched her shoes with a stick, and the soles spread a foot on each side. So she easily got over the shaky marsh. The burning wood was at the edge of the bog, and there the good fairy flung a damp, thick cloak over her, and through the flames she went, and a hair of her head was not singed. Then they passed through the dark cavern of horrors, when she’d have heard the most horrible yells, only that the fairy stopped her ears with wax. She saw frightful things, with blue vapours round them, and felt the sharp rocks and the slimy backs of frogs and snakes.

When they got out of the cavern, they were at
the mountain of glass; and then the fairy made
her slippers so sticky with a tap of her rod that
she followed the young corpse quite easily to
the top. There was the deep sea a quarter of a
mile under them, and so the corpse said to her,
“Go home to my mother, and tell her how far
you came to do her bidding. Farewell!” He
sprung head-foremost down into the sea, and
after him she plunged, without stopping a
moment to think about it.
She was stupefied at first, but when they
reached the waters she recovered her thoughts.
After piercing down a great depth, they saw a
green light towards the bottom. At last they
were below the sea, that seemed a green sky
above them; and, sitting in a beautiful meadow,
she half-asleep, and her head resting against his
side. She couldn’t keep her eyes open, and she
couldn’t tell how long she slept; but when she
woke, she was in bed at his house, and he and
his mother sitting by her bedside, and watching her.

It was a witch that had a spite to the young man because he wouldn’t marry her, and so she got power to keep him in a state between life and death till a young woman would rescue him by doing what she had done. So, at her request, her sisters got their own shapes again, and were sent back to their mother, with their spades of gold and shovels of silver. Maybe they were better after that, but I doubt it much. The youngest got the young gentleman for her husband. I’m sure she lived happy, and, if they didn’t live happy—that we may!

Patrick Kennedy.