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Another old man said:  ’There was a young man looking for service one time; and a farmer said he would take him to mind his cattle.  For a great many of his cattle had died with the herds he had, and he didn’t know what the reason was.

So the first morning the young man led them up as he was told, to the green grassy place on the top of Cruachmaa.  And when he looked about him there, he noticed it to be very dirty and trampled by the cattle.  So he brought them to graze in the fields at the side of the hill; and he came back, and cleared all the dirt from that field till it was green and smooth.  And no more of the cattle died.

’He was up in the field one day, and he saw a great hurling match going on; and one side had a young man at the head of it, and it was beating the other.  So the next day he went to the wood, and he cut a hurl; and he was all that day and the next shaping it; and his mother asked was he going to a match, and he said he was only amusing himself with it.

’The next night he went up to the field to give a hand; and the king of the fairies came up to him, and asked would he join his side that was the weakest, and he said he would.  And he drove the ball to the goal every time, and they gave the other side a great beating.  And the king of the fairies thanked him, and said they had been able to do nothing till they had a living person along with them.

’Then the king asked would he come along with him to bring away the King of Spain’s daughter that he wanted for a wife.  And the young man agreed to that.  And the king raised them both into the air as if they were a wisp of straw; and they flew away on the air like two feathers.

’When they came to the court of the King of Spain, there was a great ball going on; and they went in, but no one could see them.  And the fairy king said to the young man that he would know which was the princess by hearing her sneeze.  And presently the most beautiful young lady that was there gave a sneeze; and the young man said, “God bless her.”  “Don’t say that again,” said the fairy king, “or she’ll be lost to us.”  So she sneezed twice after that, and he said nothing.  And then the fairy king said:  “Let you take hold of her now and bring her out, and I will make something in her own shape to put in her place, the way they won’t miss her.”  So the young man took a hold of her and brought her outside; and then the fairy king came out, and they went away like feathers in the air.

’And when they came to Irish land, the fairy king said:  “Now you may give her to me.”  “Indeed I will not,” said the young man, “after all the trouble I went through; but I will keep her for myself to be my own wife.”  “If you do,” said the fairy king “you will have nothing better than a stone, for she will have no speech.”

’But the young man brought her to his own house; and his mother seeing her in her ball dress, thought it was one of the ladies from Castle Hacket come for a visit, and she was astonished when the son said she was to be his wife.  But all the time she could not speak; and at last the young man went up to the field on the hill, and he brought a tar-barrel with him, and he gathered sticks and ferns, and put them all around, and began to set fire to them.