all her wealth; and Federigo, with a wife so excellent and so long beloved, and riches equal to his desires, showed that he had learned to be a better steward, and long enjoyed true happiness.

CUNNING TOM AND THE LEPRECHAUN.

(Versified from Thomas Keightley.)

BY THE EDITOR.

Leprechaun—an Irish Fairy, keeper of the hidden

treasure

Thus described within the pages of the famed historian Keightley;

He who wrote about the Dwarfs, he who toiled with so much pleasure,

Storing up each lay and legend of the Fays and Goblins sprightly;

He who brought to light the lore of the Elves of Scandinavia,

The Nixes and the Kobolds, and the fairies without number,

Of their trixy doings telling-of their lives and their behaviour

Making record and embalming in the pages where they slumber

Till awakened into being by the fancy of the reader,— Who can picture what they were and can almost seem to see them,

He who loved the fairy creed and for it became a pleader,

Till of wishing ill to mortals we at last agreed to free them,

For he told us that they worked not without meaning, nor in blindness,

But loved cleanliness and honesty, and truth alone rewarded;

That they punished only evil ways and even those in kindness;

This the moral by the record of their mystic rites afforded.

Listen then unto the story of the Leprechaun, a Fairy, Told in prose by honest Keightley, which in rhyme we'll strive to vary.

A good-looking boy-of the county of Clare,
One Thomas Fitzpatrick by name,

Had often been heard to lament and declare
That to live, and die, poor, was a shame.

Yet Tom was long known to be lazy

-a loon
Who still for the future would wait,
There was not another left off work so soon,
Nor one that began work so late.

But still he cried out how he little had got,
And how he should like to have more ;—
He might have been rich, but if work he would not,
How was he to add to his store?

Now Tom of the Leprechaun often had heard,
And vowed that he thought he could match him ;
But in order to make Tom as good as his word,
It was requisite first-he should catch him.

He thought could he into his power once get,
That Hop-o'-my-Thumb of a Fairy,
He than all his neighbours might richer be yet,
And live like a nobleman-rarely.

"For," thus argued Tom, "I am stronger than he, So he must do just as he's bidden;

I'll make him confess, when I catch him, to me,
The spot where the treasure lies hidden.

"I know in the wars, when stern Strongbow the Bold, His heroes led over the field,

That the people were frightened and buried their gold, And to me he the treasure shall yield."

So play, but not work, was Tom's motto, but still No Leprechaun came to his aid,

His fortune to make and his wishes fulfil,

Though he'd bought a new pickaxe and spade.

At last, one fine day, as he strolled by himself,
As he did, the most selfish of rogues,
He spied in a field the identical elf—
The Leprechaun-making of brogues.

For fairies, you know, have full often a trade,
And work for each other like brothers,
And this Leprechaun, fairy boots and shoes made,
For the use and the wear of the others.

His form was the form of a little old man,
And he sat on a small wooden stool,
With a little brown pitcher, from which he began
To drink something pleasant and cool.

A little cocked hat stuck atop of his head,
He'd a neat little apron of leather;

He'd a lapstone, a hammer, and bristles and thread, And a cobbler he looked altogether.

He didn't see Tom, as he slyly crept near,

For he was not given to shirking,

But he knocked at his heel-piece, then pulled at his

beer,

And so kept on drinking and working.

Said Tom to himself, "Sure my fortune is made!
And only to think of the size of him ;
The only way now to secure them, 'tis said,
Is never to take once one's eyes off 'em."

So Tom shifted round till he got to his back,
And then he sat down by the side of him,
And then on the pitcher he seized in a crack,

But would not drink at all for the pride of him.

"You're welcome to taste it," the Leprechaun cried, Tom thought there might be something queer in it, He'd heard folks who drank with fairies had died.

The Leprechaun said, "Sure, it's beer in it."

"It's beer!" exclaimed Tom, "when there's never a shop,

For miles and miles round to be buying it; No, no, Master Fairy, I'll not touch a drop, So your joke upon me don't be trying it.'

"It's no joke at all," said the cobbler, “I work, And so earn a right to the drink of it—” Then he hammered away at his shoe like a Turk, "Tut, man, drink-and just say what you think of it."

"I'd drink fast enough," replied Tom,

66 were I sure It contained not some fairy ingredient." Quoth the fairy, "It's brewed from the heather, it's pure."

Quoth Tom, "I don't think it expedient."

"Why, then," said the fairy, "you'd better go home, My time here you only are hindering;

Get out of my workshop."

cried Tom,

"Your workshop?"

"Why it's got ne'er a door nor a window in."

The fairy grew wrath at Tom's treating him so,
Tom, by looking so long, felt a dizziness,
Which greatly increased when the fairy said "Go,
You had much better mind your own business."

"There's your father's old cow has broke into the oats,

And the pig it is knocking the corn about, The dog's in the house, and is tearing your coats, And the cat all her kittens has borne about."

Then Tom, nearly losing his presence of mind,
On thinking of home and the state of it,
He just on the point was of looking behind,
When the fairy 'd have beat a retreat of it.

But he thought, "If I once take my eyes off the elf,
I shall never be able to dab at him,

He'll be off in a crack, taking care of himself—”
And so, suddenly, Tom made a grab at him.

No chance had the Leprechaun then to escape,
In cunning Tom proved far the quicker,
But he, in his hurry the fairy to take,
Kicked the pitcher, and upset the liquor.

The Leprechaun said, "What a folly is this?
To see how good liquor is wasted;

Some day you'll regret such a chance you miss,
And that fairy-beer you never tasted.”

But Tom had him firm in his grasp, and he said,
As his hold on the fairy he tightened,
"I'm master here now, and am not to be led,
Nor be by a Leprechaun frightened;

"So speak-or I'll break every bone in your skin— Where am I to dig for the treasure?

No fencing the question-I want to begin;"

Said the fairy, "I'll tell you with pleasure.

"About four fields off there's a large crock of gold, And there it's been hidden for ages;

And now, Master Tom, wont you slacken your hold? Surely the labourer's worthy his wages."

"I'm not such a fool as to trust you," said Tom, "Your cunning would mine soon beat hollow, So show me the place-me you do not stir from ; Which way?—I am ready to follow."