“How long they played it was never rightly known; but one thing is sure, they drank a cruel deal of sperits. Three quart bottles my father brought with him were all finished, and by that time his brain was so confused with the liquor, and all he lost,--for somehow he never won a game,--that he was getting very quarrelsome. “‘You have your own luck to it,’ says he, at last. “‘True for you; and besides, we play a great deal where I come from.’ “‘I’ve heard so,’ says my father. ‘I lead the knave, sir; spades! Bad cess to it, lost again!’ “Now it was really very distressing; for by this time, though they only began for a pint of Beamish, my father went on betting till he lost the hearse and all the six horses, mourning cloaks, plumes, and everything. “‘Are you tired, Mr. Free? May be you’d like to stop?’ “‘Stop! faith it’s a nice time to stop; of course not.’ “‘Well, what will ye play for now?’ “The way he said these woods brought a trembling all over my father, and his blood curdled in his heart. ‘Oh, murther!’ says he to himself, ‘it’s my sowl he’s wanting all the time.’ “‘I’ve mighty little left,’ says my father, looking at him keenly, while he kept shuffling the cards quick as lightning. “‘Mighty little; no matter, we’ll give you plenty of time to pay,--and if you can’t do it, it shall never trouble you as long as you live.’ “‘Oh, you murthering devil!’ says my father, flying at him with a spade that he had behind his chair, ‘I’ve found you out.’ “With one blow he knocked him down, and now a terrible fight begun, for the ghost was very strong, too; but my father’s blood was up, and he’d have faced the Devil himself then. They rolled over each other several times, the broken bottles cutting them to pieces, and the chairs and tables crashing under them. At last the ghost took the bottle that lay on the hearth, and levelled my father to the ground with one blow. Down he fell, and the bottle and the whiskey were both dashed into the fire. That was the end of it, for the ghost disappeared that moment in a blue flame that nearly set fire to my father as he lay on the floor. “Och, it was a cruel sight to see him next morning, with his cheek cut open and his hands all bloody, lying there by himself,--all the broken glass and the cards all round him,--the coffin, too, was knocked down off the chair, may be the ghost had trouble getting into it. However that was, the funeral was put off for a day, for my father couldn’t speak; and as for the sexton, it was a queer thing, but when they came to call him in the morning, he had two black eyes, and a gash over his ear, and he never knew how he got them. It was easy enough to know the ghost did it; but my father kept the secret, and never told it to any man, woman, or child in them parts.” CHAPTER IX. LISBON.