corn without filling it with sand; so, after a great deal of time lost in searching for a stone, I gave it over, and resolved to look out for a great block of hard wood, which I found indeed much easier; and getting one as big as I had strength to stir, I rounded it, and formed it on the outside with my axe and hatchet, and then, with the help of fire and infinite labour, made a hollow place in it, as the Indians in Brazil make their canoes. After this, I made a great heavy pestle or beater of the wood called the iron-wood; and this I prepared and laid by against my next crop of corn, which I proposed to myself to grind, or rather pound into meal to make bread,

My next difficulty was to make a sieve or search to dress my meal, and to part it from the bran and the husk; without which I did not see it possible I could have any bread. This was a most difficult thing even to think on, for to be sure I had nothing like the necessary thing to make it; I mean fine thin canvas or stuff to search the meal through. And here I was at a full stop for many months; nor did I really know what to do. Linen I had none left, but what was mere rags; I had goats'hair, but neither knew how to weave it or spin it; and had I known how, here were no tools to work it with. All the remedy that I found for this was, that at last I did remember I had among the seamen's clothes which were saved out of the ship some neckcloths of calico or muslin; and with some pieces of these I made three small sieves proper enough for the work; and thus I made shift

for some years: how I did afterwards I shall show in its place.

The baking part was the next thing to be considered, and how I should make bread when I came to have corn; for, first, I had no yeast; as to that part, there was no supplying the want, so I did not concern myself much about it. But for an oven I was indeed in great pain. At length I found out an experiment for that also, which was this: I made some earthen vessels very broad, but not deep, that is to say, about two feet diameter, and not above nine inches deep; these I burned in the fire, as I had done the other, and laid them by. And when I wanted to bake I made a great fire upon my hearth, which I had paved with some square tiles, of my own baking and burning also; but I should not call them square.

When the firewood was burned pretty much into embers, or live coals, I drew them forward upon this hearth, so as to cover it all over, and there I let them lie till the hearth was very hot; then sweeping away all the embers, I set down my loaf, or loaves, and whelming down the earthen pot upon them, drew the embers all round the outside of the pot, to keep in and add to the heat. And thus, as well as in the best oven in the world, I baked my barley-loaves, and became in little time a good pastry cook into the bargain; for I made myself several cakes and puddings of the rice; but I made no pies, neither had I anything to put into them, supposing I had, except the flesh either of fowls or goats. Daniel Defoe.

IX.

KATHLEEN.

O NORAH, lay your basket down,
And rest your weary hand,

And come and hear me sing a song
Of our old Ireland.

There was a lord of Galaway,

A mighty lord was he;

And he did wed a second wife,

A maid of low degree.

But he was old, and she was young,

And so, in evil spite,

She baked the black bread for his kin,

And fed her own with white.

She whipped the maids and starved the kern,1

66

And drove away the poor;

Ah, woe is me!" the old lord said,

"I rue my bargain sore!"

This lord he had a daughter fair,

Beloved of old and young,

And nightly round the shealing-fires 2

Of her the gleeman sung.

"As sweet and good is young Kathleen

As Eve before her fall;'

So sang the harper at the fair,

So harped he in the hall.

"O come to me, my daughter dear!
Come sit upon my knee,

For looking in your face, Kathleen,
Your mother's own I see!"

He smoothed and smoothed her hair away,

He kissed her forehead fair:

"It is my darling Mary's brow,
It is my darling's hair!"

O, then spake up the angry dame,
"Get up, get up," quoth she,
"I'll sell ye over Ireland,

I'll sell ye o'er the sea!"
She clipped her glossy hair away,
That none her rank might know,
She took away her gown of silk,
And gave her one of tow,3

And sent her down to Limerick town,
And to a seaman sold

This daughter of an Irish lord

For ten good pounds in gold.

The lord he smote upon his breast,
And tore his beard so gray;

But he was old, and she was young,

And so she had her way.

Sure that same night the Banshee1 howled

To fright the evil dame,

And fairy folks, who loved Kathleen,

With funeral torches came.

She watched them glancing through the trees,

And glimmering down the hill;

They crept before the dead-vault door,

And there they all stood still!

"Get up, old man! the wake-lights shine1" "Ye murthering witch," quoth he, "So I'm rid of your tongue, I little care If they shine for you or me.” "O, whoso brings my daughter back, My gold and land shall have!" O, then spake up his handsome page, "No gold nor land I crave!

"But give to me your daughter dear,
Give sweet Kathleen to me,

Be she on sea or be she on land
I'll bring her back to thee."
"My daughter is a lady born,
And you of low degree,

But she shall be your bride the day
You bring her back to me."
He sailèd east, he sailèd west,
And far and long sailed he,
Until he came to Boston town,
Across the great salt sea.

"O, have ye seen the young Kathleen,
The flower of Ireland?

Ye'll know her by her eyes so blue,

And by her snow-white hand!"

Out spake an ancient man,

"I know

The maiden whom ye mean ;

I bought her of a Limerick man,
And she is called Kathleen.

"No skill hath she in household work,

Her hands are soft and white,

Yet well by loving looks and ways

She doth her cost requite."