d not fly with
him now, because, in the first place, she had six children, and, in the
second place, it would be against the law, and, in the third place, his
mother might object. She admitted that she was unworthy of his love, and
that she should have waited, and she bore his reproaches with a meekness
which finally disarmed him.

He stropped his penknife on his boot, and said that there was nothing
left but to kill the giant, and that she had better leave the room while
he did so, because it would not be a sight for a weak woman, and he
wondered audibly how much hasty-pudding would fall out of the giant if he
stabbed him right to the heart. The princess begged him not to kill her
husband, and assured him that this giant had not got any hasty-pudding in
his heart at all, and that he was really the nicest giant that ever
lived, and, further, that he had not killed her seven brothers, but the
seven brothers of quite another person entirely, which was only a
reasonable thing to do when one looked at it properly, and she continued
in a strain which proved to him that this unnatural woman really loved
the giant.

It was more in pity than in anger that he recognised the impossibility of
rescuing this person. He saw at last that she was unworthy of being
rescued, and told her so. He said bitterly that he had grave doubts of
her being a princess at all, and that if she was married to a giant it
was no more than she deserved, and further he had a good mind to rescue
the giant from her, and he would do so in a minute, only that it was
against his principles to rescue giants.--And, saying so, he placed his
penknife between his teeth and climbed out through the window again.

He stood for a moment outside the window with his right hand extended to
the sky and the moonlight blazing on his penknife--a truly formidable
figure, and one which the princess never forgot; and then he walked
slowly away, hiding behind a cold and impassive demeanour a mind that was
tortured and a heart that had plumbed most of the depths of human
suffering.

III

Aloysius Murphy went a-courting when the woods were green. There were
grapes in the air and birds in the river. A voice and a song went
everywhere, and the voice said, "Where is my beloved?" and the song
replied, "Thy beloved is awaiting thee, and she stretches her hands
abroad and laughs for thy coming; bind then the feather of a bird to
thy heel and a red rose upon thy hair, and go quickl