The squire is heard outside calling his dogs. Duffy starts up in a fright, seizes a furze-prong, and says, "Master will be here in a minute, jump into the huccarner (wood-corner) and I'll cover thee up with the furze."
Huey hesitates.
Duffy:—"Then crawl into the oven: a little more baking will make thee no worse."
Huey gets into an oven, opening on to the fire-place and behind the chimney-stool, just as the Squire enters and calls out,
"Jone, take up the pie, if its ready or raw. I'm as hungry as a hound."
Duffy, rising to uncover a pie that was baking on the hearth, says, "Master, I have staid up to give ye your supper, because An Jone es gone to bed very bad with a cramp in her stomach and wind in her head, so she said."
"Why I heard thee talking when I came to the door, who was here then?" demanded the Squire.
"Only a great owl, master dear," she replied, "that fell down from the ivy-bush growing over the chimney and perched hisself there on the stool, with his great goggle eyes, and stood staring at me and blinkan like a fool. Then he cried Hoo! hoo! Tu-wit, tu-woo; and, when you opened the door, he flew up the chimney the same way he came down."
The Squire, satisfied with Duffy's explanation, advances, and puts his foot on the hearth-stone, looks at his legs, saying, "Duffy, my dear, these are the very best stockings I ever had in my life. I've been hunting all day, over moors and downs, through furze and thorns, among brambles and bogs, in the worst of weather, yet there isn't a scratch on my legs and they are as dry as if bound up in leather."
The Devil (supposed to be invisible) rises behind Duffy and grimaces at the Squire.