I came off
as soon as I was up."
"Be sure to look when you get back, Pat," says the fairy man, "and
good luck to ye."
With which he disappeared, and Pat went home. He looked for the
furze-blossoms, as the fairy man told him, and there's not a word of
truth in this tale if they weren't all pure gold pieces.
Well, now Pat was so rich, he went to the shoemaker to order another
pair of brogues, and being a kindly, gossiping boy, the shoemaker soon
learned the whole story of the fairy man and the Rath. And this so
stirred up the shoemaker's greed that he resolved to go the very next
night himself, to see if he could not dance with the fairies, and have
like luck.
He found his way to the Rath all correct, and sure enough the fairies
were dancing, and they asked him to join. He danced the soles off his
brogues, as Pat did, and the fairy man lent him his shoes, and sent
him home in a twinkling.
As he was going over the ditch, he looked round, and saw the roots of
the furze-bushes glowing with precious stones as if they had been
glow-worms.
"Will you help yourself, or take what's given ye?" said the fairy man.
"I'll help myself, if you please," said the cobbler, for he
thought--"If I can't get more than Pat brought home, my fingers must
all be thumbs."
So he drove his hand into the bushes, and if he didn't get plenty, it
wasn't for want of grasping.
When he got up in the morning, he went straight to the jewels.
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