mouth was merry and loud for song;
Each night when set by the ingle-wall
He was the merriest man of them all.
I would catch at his beard and say
All the things I had done in the day--
Tumbled bowlders over the force,
Swum in the river and fired the gorse--
"Half the side of the hill!" quoth I:--
"Ah!" cried he, "and didn't you die?"

"Chut!" said he, "but the squeak was narrow!
Didn't you meet with Johnnie Kigarrow?"
"No!" said I, "and who will he be?
And what will be Johnnie Kigarrow to me?"
The farmer's son said under his breath,
"Johnnie Kigarrow may be your death
Listen you here, and keep you still--
Johnnie Kigarrow bides under the hill;
Twloch barrow stands over his head;
He shallows the river to make his bed;
Bowlders roll when he stirs a limb;
And the gorse on the hills belongs to him!
And if so be one fires his gorse,
He's out of his bed, and he mounts his horse.
Off he sets: with the first long stride
He is halfway over the mountain side:
With his second stride he has crossed the barrow,
And he has you fast, has Johnnie Kigarrow!"

Half I laughed and half I feared;
I clutched and tugged at the strong man's beard,
And bragged as brave as a boy could be--
"So? but, you see, he didn't catch me!"

Fear caught hold of me: what had I done?
High as the roof rose the farmer's son:
How the sight of him froze my marrow!
"I," he cried, "am Johnnie Kigarrow!"

Well, you wonder, what was the end?
Never forget;--he had called me "friend"!
Mighty of limb, and hard, and blown;
Quickly he laughed and set me down.
"Heh!" said, he, "but the squeak was narrow,
Not to be caught by Johnnie Kigarrow!"

Now, I hear, after years gone by,
Nobody knows how he came to die.
He strode out one night of storm:
"Get you to bed, and keep you warm!"
Out into darkness so went he:
Nobody knows where his bones may be.

Only I think--if his tongue let go
Truth that once,--how perhaps _I_ know.
Twloch river, and Twloch barrow,
Do you cover my Johnnie Kigarrow?

LETTER XLIV.

Dearest: I have been doing something so wise and foolish: mentally wise,
I mean, and physically foolish. Do you guess?--Disobeying your parting
injunction, and sitting up to see eclipses.

It was such a luxury to do as I was _not_ told just for onc