252 SPORTING REMINISCENCES 



you cease to look at him he is gone. A Uttle man 

 in red, with a green cap and plausibly polite. 



Old James Corbett used to tell us quite seriously 

 how his wife's cousin be marriage chanced on the 

 Leprechaun and cot and held him. 



" ' Let ye show me some goold now/ says me 

 cousin, ' or I will not let ye go.' 



" 'With the greatest pleasure in life,' says the 

 Leprechaun, says he, tuckin' away his boot. 

 * Just oberight ye there is some be the withered 

 three. 7s that the withered three though ? ' says 

 he, thoughtful like. * Me eyes is bad.' 



" ' Have done,' says me cousin, * I will look for 

 nothin',' says he, ' but watch yourself, ye an' 

 ye're threes an' bushes,' says he. 



" ' I see ye are too clever for me,' says the fairy 

 man, laffin. * Well come along,' says he, * for 

 the quicker I give ye the goold, the quicker ye 

 will let me to me work,' says he. 



" So they went across the field, the Leprechaun 

 as merry as ye'd fancy and he chatterin' aisy and 

 pleasant. 



" ' I like to oblige a fine boy like yourself,' says 

 he, as they came anear the bank where he said the 

 goold was. ' An' how Nora Daly,' says he, * can be 

 sittin' on the bank there with Pat Magee,' says 

 he, * an' she promised to yerself,' an' he shook 

 his head. 



" * Sittin' where ? ' roars me cousin, lookin' 

 away. But then his hands were empty an' all he 



