e greater part of the
parish.

Flanagan soon rejoined Connor, who, on taxing him with his flight, was
informed, with an appearance of much regret, that a debt of old standing
due to Curtis had occasioned it.

"And upon my saunies, Connor, I'd rather any time go up to my neck in
wather than meet a man that I owe money to, whin I can't pay him. I knew
Phil very well, even before he spoke, and that was what made me cut an'
run."

"What!" said Connor, looking towards the east, "can it be day-light so
soon?"

"Begad, it surely cannot," replied his companion.

"Holy mother above us, what is this?"

Both involuntarily stood to contemplate the strange phenomenon which
presented itself to their observation; and, as it was certainly both
novel and startling in its appearance, we shall pause a little to
describe it more minutely.

The night, as we have already said, was remarkably dark, and warm to an
unusual degree. To the astonishment, however, of our two travellers,
a gleam of light, extremely faint, and somewhat resembling that which
precedes the rising of a summer sun, broke upon their path, and passed
on in undulating sweeps for a considerable space before them. Connor had
scarcely time to utter the exclamation just alluded to, and Flanagan to
reply to him, when the light around them shot farther into the distance
and deepened from its first pale hue into a rich and gorgeous purple.
Its effect, however, was limited within a circle of about a mile, for
they could observe that it got faint gradually, from the centre to the
extreme verge, where it melted into utter darkness.

"They must mean something extraordinary," said Connor; "whatever it is,
it appears to be behind the hill that divides us from Bodagh's Buie's
house. Blessed earth! it looks as if the sky was on fire!"

The sky, indeed, presented a fearful but sublime spectacle. One spot
appeared to glow with the red-white heat of a furnace, and to form the
centre of a fiery cupola, from which the flame was flung in redder and
grosser masses, that darkened away into wild and dusky indistinctness,
in a manner that corresponded with the same light, as it danced in red
and frightful mirth upon the earth. As they looked, the cause of this
awful phenomenon soon became visible. From behind the hill was seen
a thick shower of burning particles rushing up into the mid air,
and presently the broad point of a huge pyramid of fire, wavering in
terrible and capricious power