Page:Darby O'Gill and the Good People by Herminie Templeton Kavanagh (1903).djvu/156

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THE ADVENTURES OF KING BRIAN CONNORS
Come att ye thrue-born Irishmen wherever you may be,
I hope you’ll pay attintion and listen unto me-e-e,
And if you’ll pay attintion the truth I will declare
How Donnelly fought Cooper on the Curraah of Kildare.”

Prayers were never from Peggy’s heart, so as she listened to the enthrancing song she turned from praying to plotting.

“If I had that child,” she says, “I could go from fair to fair and from pathron to pathron, and his singing’d fill my apron with silver.”

The King turned to another ditty, and you’d think he was a thrush.

They’ll kiss you, they’ll car-r-ress you,” he sang.
They’ll spind your money free,
But of all the towns in Ire-eland Kilkenny for me-e-e-e.”

The gray-haired ould rascal, Peggy, by this was creeping ever and ever till she raiched the cart. Up then she popped, and the first thing me poor Captain knew the shawl was slapped fast on his face, and two long, thin arms were dragging him out over the wheel. He thried to cry out, but the shawl choked him, and scrambling and kicking did him no good.

Over the nearest stile bounced Peggy, and into the nearest field she flew, her petticoat lifted, her white

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