"I think we'd better try somewhere else," whispered Joe to me; "I don't like the look of this place." Before I could reply to this, a loud yell burst forth from the end of the street, accompanied by the tramp of many people, who seemed to move in a kind of regulated step. "Here they are! Here they come!" cried the old woman; "step in quick, or ye 'll be too late!" and she dragged the young girls forward by the cloak into the hall; we followed without further question. Then, placing the lantern on the floor, she drew a heavy chain across the door, and dropped her cloak over the light, saying in a low, tremulous voice, "Them's the 'Tapageers!'" The crowd now came closer, and we perceived that they were singing in chorus a song, of which the air, at least, was Irish. The barbarous rhyme of one rude verse, as they sung it in passing, still lingers in my memory: "No bloody agint here we see, Ready to rack, distrain, and saze us; Whatever we ax, we have it free, And take at hand, whatever plaze us. Row, row, row, Will yez show me, now, The polis that 'll dare to face us!" "There they go! 'tis well ye wor safe!" said the old hag, as the sounds died away, and all became silent in the street without. "Who or what are they?" said I, my curiosity being stimulated by fear. "Them 's the 'Tapageers '! The chaps that never spared man or woman in their rounds. 'T is bad enough, the place is; but they make it far worse!" "Can we stop here for the night?" said Joe, growing impatient at the colloquy. "And what for wud ye stop here?" asked the crone, as she held up the lantern the better to see him who made the demand. "We want our supper, and a place to sleep," said the old man; "and we 're able and willin' to pay for both." "'T is a nice place ye kem for either!" said she; and she leaned back against the wall and laughed with a fiend-like malice that made my blood chill. "Then I suppose we must go somewhere else," said Joe. "Come, boys; 't is no use losing our time here!" "God speed you!" said she, preparing to undo the chain that fastened the door. "Ye have bould hearts, any way! There they go! d' ye hear them?" This was said in a half-whisper, as the wild yells of the "Tapageers" arose without; and soon after, the noise and tumult of a scuffle,--at least we could hear the crashing of sticks, and the shouting of a fray; from which, too, piercing cries for help burst forth. "What are ye doin'? Are ye mad? Are ye out of your sinses?" cried the hag, as Joe endeavored to wrest open the chain, the secret of which he did not understand. "They're murdering some one without there!" said he. "Let me free, or I'll kick down your old door this minute!" "Kick away, honey!" said the hag; "as strong men as yourself tried that a'ready; and--d'ye hear?--it's done now; it 's _over!_" These terrible words were in allusion to a low kind of sobbing sound, which grew fainter and fainter, and then ceased altogether.