lan. He was straight and tall, with blue,
clear eyes, and a frank, fair face. Some of the M'Swynes, who were a
rough, burly race, looked scornfully on him and said that he was fitter
to make love to ladies than to head men on a battle-field; but they
wronged him when they said that, for no braver soldier than Dermot had
ever led their clan. He was both brave and gentle too, and courteous,
and tender, and kind; and as for being only fit to make love to
ladies--why, making love to ladies was almost the only thing he never
did.

"Are you not going to bring home a wife to the old house, my son?" said
his foster-mother, an old woman who had lived with him all her life.
"Before I die I'd love to dandle a child of yours upon my knee."

But Dermot only shook his head. "My wife, I fear, will be hard to win. I
may have to wait for her all my days." And then, after a little while,
when the old woman still went on talking to him, "How can I marry when
my love has been asleep these three hundred years?"

This was the first time that he had spoken about Eileen for many a day,
and the old nurse had thought, like everybody else, that he had
forgotten that old legend and all the foolish fancies of his youth.

She was sitting at her spinning-wheel, but she dropped the thread and
folded her hands sadly on her knees.

"My son, why think on her that's as good as dead? Even if you could win
her, would you take a bewitched maiden to be your wife?"

It was a summer's day, and Dermot stood looking far away through the
sunshine toward where, though he could not see it, the enchanted castle
lay. He had stood in that same place a thousand times, looking toward
it, dreaming over the old tale.

For several minutes he made no answer to what the old woman had said;
then all at once he turned round to her.

"Nurse," he said passionately, "I have adored her for twenty years. Ever
since I first stood at your knees, and you told me of her, she has been
the one love of my heart. Unless I can marry her, I will never marry any
woman in this world." He came to the old woman's side, and though he was
a full-grown man, he put his arms about her neck. "Nurse, you have a
keen woman's wit; cannot you help me with it?" he said. "I have wandered
round the lough by day and night and challenged the magician to come and
try his power against me, but he does not hear me, or he will not come.
How can I reach him through those dark, cruel waters and force him to