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his arrival at home to his great disappointment he found that 
it was nothing but base metal. 
This is not the only legend which the peasantry of the 
neighbourhood have preserved relative to Willey-hou. They 
tell you gravely that years ago some avaricious personage 
dug into the tumulus in order to gain possession of the 
treasure it was supposed to contain. At length, after much 
labour, he came to an immense iron chest, the receptacle of 
the coveted riches, but the lid was no sooner uncovered, 
than it lifted itself up a little, and out sprang an immense 
black cat, which seated itself upon the chest, and glowered 
with eyes of fire upon the insolent intruders. Not daunted 
by this, after making various ineffectual attempts to move 
the chest, the digger for treasure fixed to it a strong 
chain or rope, to which he attached so numerous a team of 
horses, according to some accounts, or bullocks, according 
to others, that they reached two and two from the tumulus 
to North Burton, a distance of full a mile and a half. When 
all these preparations were completed, the director of these 
operations gave the order for moving exultingly in the 
following words — of course addressing his animals : — 
Hep Joan ! prow Mark ! 
Whether God will or no, 
We'll have this ark. 
He had hardly uttered the words, when the rope and the 
traces broke in a hundred places, and the chest of treasure 
disappeared for ever. 
There is a certain air of quaintness about the rhymes 
which seems to speak for the antiquity of this legend. The 
peasantry assure you further, that if any one run nine 
times round the tumulus without stopping, and then put 
his ear against it, he will distinctly hear the fairies 
dancing and singing in the interior. The old superstitious 
