groaned deeply at this reply from her graceless husband.

   "Some time or another," said she, "thou wilt rue these wicked speeches; and who knows whether these very words of thine may not have been heard i' the Fairies' Chapel, or whispered away beyond the forest to the witches' tryst!"

   "I care not for all the imps and warlocks i' th' parish, hags and old women to boot. Let them come face to face. Here am I, honest Ralph the miller, who never took toll from an empty sack, nor e'er missed the mouth of a full one. Tol-de-rol."

   Here he stood, with arms akimbo, as if daring the whole fellowship of Satan, with their abettors and allies. This speech, too, was doubtless reported at the Fairies' Chapel hard by; for the dame vowed ever after that she heard, as it were, an echo, or a low sooning sound, ending with an eldritch laugh, amongst the rocks in that direction. This well-known haunt of the elves and fays, ere they had fled before the march of science and civilisation, was but a good bowshot from the mill, and would have terrified many a stouter heart, had not familiarity lulled their apprehensions, and habit blunted the edge of their fears. Strangers often wondered that any human being dared to sojourn so near the haunts of the "good people," and were sure that, sooner or later, the inhabitants would rue so dangerous a proximity.

   A few evenings after this foolhardy challenge Ralph had been scrambling away, far up the dingle, for a supply of firewood. The same keen tinkling air was abroad, but the sky, where the sun had thrown his long coronal of rays, was streaked across with a mottled and hazy light, probably the forerunner of a change. Ralph was labouring down the steep with his load, crashing through the boughs, and shaking off their hoary burdens in his progress. Suddenly he heard the shrill and well-known shriek of a hare struggling in the toils. At this joyful and refreshing sound the miller's appetite was wonderfully stimulated; his darling propensities were immediately called forth; he threw down his burden, and, rushing through the brake, he saw, or thought he saw, in the soft twilight, an

   unfortunate puss in the noose. He threw himself hastily forward expecting to grasp the prize, when lo! up started the timid animal, and limping away, as if hurt, kept the liquorish poacher at her heels, every minute supposing he was sure of his prey. Rueful was the pilgrimage of the unfortunate hunter. The hare doubled, and sprang aside whenever he came within striking distance, then hirpling onward as before. 

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