"Nay, dear grandfather, it is, after all, a country fair and pleasant to the eye, and once my dear mother rejoins us with the cows and 'garrans,' there can be no lack of plenty, even in these wilds." "Cows and garrans! And where are we to feed them, girl? Do you expect to find the pleasant grazing-lands of Meath on the tops of these barren hills? or are we to fatten our flocks on the sea-drift, which, I have heard say, the natives of these wilds are in the habit of gathering on the shore and boiling down into food, not for their cattle, (they have none, poor wretches!) but themselves?" "Some of these hills certainly look black and bare enough, but still I doubt not that among their glens and hollow places we shall find many a good acre of green grass for the grazing of our cattle," the girl answered patiently, and with an evident determination to look, for the present at least, only on the bright side of the question. "And now, dear sir," she added gently, "had we not best move onward? for if yonder tower is really to be our home, the sooner we are there the better." She glanced toward the castle as she spoke, and the old man saw that she started violently as she did so. She said not another word, however; but he fancied that her cheek grew a shade paler--if that were possible--than it had been before, as she continued to gaze silently in that direction. "What is it, Nellie?" he cried at last, frightened by her strange looks and silence. "What do you see, child, that you look so white and scared?" "See!" she answered slowly and reluctantly, "there seems to be a party of many people gathering in the court-yard; the house, therefore, must be inhabited already!" {189} "People in the court-yard!" cried the old man, now fairly aroused to that same fear which had been haunting Nellie for the last half-hour. "What people, Nellie? Tell me, child, if you can distinguish whether they seem to be natives or strangers to the place. Our fate, alas! may be dependent on that fact." The girl walked forward, and shading her eyes with her hand from the blinding sunshine, looked again, and yet again, in the direction of the tower. "Yes," she said at last; "I was not mistaken. There is a party in the court-yard, and some of them are even standing in the gate-way, as if they had but this instant stept forth from the mansion. Surely, grandfather, we cannot have misunderstood or mistaken our instructions? There is no other building to be seen--even in the distance--and this one answers in all respects to the description. The man, too, from whom we inquired our way this morning, assured us that it was called 'The Rath'--the very name set down in our certificate. We cannot have been mistaken, and yet--and yet--if there be persons already in possession, their claim must needs be superior to our own."