Pat Hegarty, the knight's guide, used to recount the sufferings they underwent. Their afflictions by day were bad enough; but these were nothing, compared to their nocturnal visitations. "My! what a place for fleas!" said an English femme de chambre who happened to be an accidental listener. "How numerous they must have been!"
"Numerous!" exclaimed the guide, "mona mon diaoul, if they had only pulled together, they would have dragged me out of bed!"
Since the knight's excursion, Torry has been more frequently visited. In executing the Ordnance survey, a party of Sappers and Miners were encamped upon the island, and the engineer officer in command amused many of his solitary hours by collecting traditionary tales from the narration of an old man, who was far more intelligent than the rest of the inhabitants. The two foregoing legends were taken from the patriarch's lips, and they afford an additional proof of that fondness which man, in his savage state, ever evinces for traditions that are wonderful and wild.
SONG OF THE MONTH. No. XII.
December, 1837.
All hail to thee, thou good old boy, December!
Sick of that sullen, sulky Dan November,
The very sight of thy bald, reverend, jolly,