purtiest gooseberry eyes in Europe; and only for the squint in the other, it would have been the ornament of her comely face entirely; but as it was, no human bein’ was ever able to decide between them.  She had two buck teeth in the front of her mouth that nobody could help admirin’; and, indeed, altogether I don’t wondher that the devil fell in consate wid her, for, by all accounts, they say he carries a sweet tooth himself for comely ould women like Bet Harramount.  Give the tasty ould chap a wrinkle any day before a dimple, when he promotes them to be witches, as he did her.  Sure he was seen kissin’ a ghost the other night near Crukanesker well, where the Davorens get their wather from.  O, thin, bedad, but Grace Davoren is a beauty all out; and maybe ’tis herself doesn’t know it.”

“Go on with your story,” said Woodward, rather dryly; “proceed.”

“Well, sir, there is Bet Harramount’s face for you, and the rest of her figure wasn’t sich as to disgrace it.  She was half bent wid age, wore an ould black bonnet, an ould red cloak, and walked wid a staff that was bent at the top, as it seems every witch must do.  Where she came from nobody could ever tell, for she was a black stranger in this part of the country.  At all events, she lived in the town below, but how she lived nobody could tell either.  Everything about her was a riddle; no wondher, considherin’ she hardly was ever known to spake to any one, from the lark to the lamb.  At length she began to be subjected by many sensible people to be something not right; which you know, sir, was only natural.  Peter O’Figgins, that was cracked—­but then it was only wid dhrink and larnin’—­said it; and Katty McTrollop, Lord Bilberry’s henwife, was of the same opinion, and from them and others the thing grew and spread until it became right well known that she was nothin’ else than a witch, and that the big wart on her neck was nothin’ more nor less than the mark the devil had set upon her, to suckle his babies by.  From this out, them that had Christian hearts and loved their religion trated the thief as she desarved to be trated.  She was hissed and hooted, thank God, wherever she showed her face; but still nobody had courage to lay a hand upon her by rason of her blasphaimin’ and cursin’, which, they say, used to make the hair stand like wattles upon the heads of them that heard her.”

“Had she not a black cat?” asked Woodward; “surely, she ought to have had a familiar.”

“No,” replied Barney; “the cat she had was a white cat, and the mainin’ of its color will appear to you by and by; at any rate, out came the truth.  You have heard of the Black Spectre—­the Shan-dhinne-dhuv?”

“I have,” replied the other; “proceed.”

“Well, sir, as I said, the truth came out at last; in the coorse of a short time she was watched at night, and seen goin’ to the haunted house, where the Spectre lives.”

“Did she walk there, or fly upon her broomstick?” asked Woodward, gravely.