ts effect, as if the spot was a chapel
consecrated to labour. There was a hush upon the devotees. The women at
the large table worked intently, steadfastly, with bowed heads. Their
old petticoats were tucked high, showing the coarse brogans which they
wore--and the visible ankles were proportioned to the brogans as the
diameter of a straw is to that of a half-crown. The national red
under-petticoat was a fundamental part of the scene.

Just over the wall, in the sloping street, could be seen the bejerseyed
Capers, brawny, and with shocks of yellow beard. They paced slowly to
and fro amid the geese and children. They, too, spoke little, even to
each other; they smoked short pipes in saturnine dignity and silence. It
was the fish. They who go with nets upon the reeling sea grow still with
the mystery and solemnity of the trade. It was Brittany; the first
respectable catch of the year had changed this garrulous Irish hamlet
into a hamlet of Brittany.

The Capers were waiting for high tide. It had seemed for a long time
that, for the south of Ireland, the mackerel had fled in company with
potato; but here, at any rate, was a temporary success, and the occasion
was momentous. A strolling Caper took his pipe and pointed with the stem
out upon the bay. There was little wind, but an ambitious skipper had
raised his anchor, and the craft, her strained brown sails idly
swinging, was drifting away on the first oily turn of the tide.

On the top of the pier the figure of the melancholy old man was
portrayed upon the polished water. He was still dangling his line
hopelessly. He gazed down into the misty water. Once he stirred and
murmured: "Bad luck to thim." Otherwise he seemed to remain motionless
for hours. One by one the fishing-boats floated away. The brook changed
its colour, and in the dusk showed a tumble of pearly white among the
rocks.

A cold night wind, sweeping transversely across the pier, awakened
perhaps the rheumatism in the old man's bones. He arose and, mumbling
and grumbling, began to wind his line. The waves were lashing the
stones. He moved off towards the intense darkness of the village
streets.

SULLIVAN COUNTY SKETCHES

FOUR MEN IN A CAVE.

LIKEWISE FOUR QUEENS, AND A SULLIVAN COUNTY HERMIT.

The moon rested for a moment on the top of a tall pine on a hill.

The little man was standing in front of the campfire making orations to
his companions.

"We can tell a great tale when we ge