The story told yesterday by Sheela the Scribe was the Magic Thread-
Clue, or the Pursuit of the Gilla Dacker, Benella and the Button Boy
being the chief characters; Finola's was the Voyage of the Children
of Corr the Swift-Footed (the Ard-ri's pseudonym for American
travellers); while mine, to be told to-morrow, is called the Quest
of the Fair Strangers, or the Fairy Quicken Tree of Devorgilla.
Chapter XXX. The Quest of the Fair Strangers, or
The Fairy Quicken-Tree of Devorgilla.*
'Before the King
The bards will sing.
And there recall the stories all
That give renown to Ireland.'
Eighteenth Century Song.
Englished by George Sigerson.
*It seems probable that this tale records a real incident which took
place in Aunt David's garden. Penelope has apparently listened with
such attention to the old Celtic romances as told by the Ard-ri and
Dermot O'Dyna that she has, consciously or unconsciously, reproduced
something of their atmosphere and phraseology. The delightful
surprise at the end must have been contrived by Salemina, when she,
in her character of Sheela the Scribe, gazed into the Horn of
Foreknowledge and learned the events that were to happen that day.--
K.D.W.
PEARLA'S STORY.
Three maidens once dwelt in a castle in that part of the Isle of
Weeping known as the cantred of Devorgilla, Devorgilla of the Green
Hill Slopes; and they were baptized according to druidical rites as
Sheela the Scribe, Finola the Festive, and Pearla the Melodious,
though by the dwellers in that land they were called the Fair
Strangers, or the Children of Corr the Swift-Footed.
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