and now on the other, running away to the end of Ireland, and for all that I knew, maybe to the end of the world itself.

The river came from the hills, tumbling over rocks in showers of fine white mist and forming into deep pools beneath, where it rested calmly after its mad race. Here the trout leaped all day, and turned the placid surface into millions of petulant ripples which broke like waves under the hazel bushes that shaded the banks. In the fords further along the heavy milch cows stood belly-deep in the stream, seeking relief from the madness that the heat and the gad-flies put into their blood.

The young cattle grazed on the braes, keeping well in the shadow of the cliffs, while from the hill above the mountain-sheep followed one another in single file, as is their wont, down to the lower and sweeter pastures.

The mowers were winding their scythes in long heavy sweeps through the meadow in the bottomlands, and rows of mown hay lay behind them. Even where I stood, far up, I could hear the sharp swish of their scythes as they cut through the bottom grass.

The young maidens, their legs bare well above their knees, tramped linen at the brookside and laughed merrily at every joke that passed between them.

The neighbours spoke to one another across the march ditches, and their talk was of the weather and the progress of the harvest.

The farmer boy could be seen going to the moor for a load of peat, his creel swinging in a careless way across his shoulders and his hands deep in his trousers' pockets. He was barefooted, and the brown moss was all over the calves of his legs. He was thinking of something as he walked along and he looked well in his torn shirt and old hat. Many a time I wondered what were the thoughts which filled his mind.

Now and again a traveller passed along the road, looking very tired as he dragged his legs after him. His hob-nailed boots made a rasping sound on the grey gravel, and it was hard to tell where he was going.

One day a drover passed along, driving his herd of wild-eyed, panting bullocks before him. He was a little man and he carried a heavy cudgel of a stick in his hands. I went out to the road to see him passing and also to speak to him if he took any notice of a little fellow.

"God's blessing be on every beast under your care," I said, repeating the words which my mother always said to the drovers which she met. "Is it any harm to ask you where you are going?"

"I'm goin' to the fair of 'Derry," said he.

"Is 'Derry fair as big as the fair of Greenanore, good man?"

He laughed at my question, and I could see his teeth black with tobacco juice. "Greenanore!" he exclaimed. "'Derry fair is a million times bigger."

Of course I didn't believe him, for had I not been at the harvest-fair of Greenanore myself, and I thought that there could be nothing greater in all the seven corners of the world. But it was in my world and I knew more of the bigger as the years went on.

In those days the world, to me, meant something intangible, which lay beyond the farthest blue line of mountains which could be seen from Glenmornan Hill. And those mountains were ever so far away! How many snug little houses, white under their coatings of cockle lime, how many wooden bridges spanning hurrying streams, and how many grey roads crossing brown moors lay between Glenmornan Hill and the last blue line of mountain tops that looked over into the world for which I longed with all the wistfulness of youth, I did not know.

CHAPTER III A CORSICAN OUTRAGE

I did not like school. My father could neither read nor write, and he didn't trouble much about my education.

The priest told him to send me to the village school, and I was sent accordingly.

"The priest should know what is best," my father said.

The master was a little man with a very large stomach. He was short of breath, and it was very funny to hear him puffing on a very warm day, when the sweat ran down his face and wetted his collar. The people about thought that he was very wise, and said that he could talk a lot of wisdom if he were not so short of breath. Whenever he sat by the school fire he fell asleep. Everyone said that though very wise the man was very lazy. When he got to his feet after a sleep he went about the schoolroom grunting like a sick cow. For the first six months at school I felt frightened of him, after that I disliked him. He beat me about three times a day. He cut hazel rods on his way to school, and used them every five minutes when not asleep. Nearly all the scholars cried whenever they were beaten, but I never did. I think this was one of his strongest reasons for hating me more than any of the rest. I learned very slowly, and never could do my sums correctly, but I liked to read the poems in the more advanced books and could recite Childe Harold's Farewell when only in the second standard.

When I was ten years of age I left school, being then only in the third book. This was the way of it. One day, when pointing out places on the map of the world, the master came round, and the weather being hot the man was in a bad temper.

"Point out Corsica, Dermod Flynn," he said.

I had not the least idea as to what part of the world Corsica occupied, and I stood looking awkwardly at the master and the map in turn. I think that he enjoyed my discomfited expression, for he gazed at me in silence for a long while.

"Dermod Flynn, point out Corsica," he repeated.

"I don't know where it is," I answered sullenly.

"I'll teach you!" he roared, getting hold of my ear and pulling it sharply. The pain annoyed me; I got angry and hardly was aware of what I was doing. I just saw his eyes glowering into mine. I raised the pointer over my head and struck him right across the face. Then a red streak ran down the side of his nose and it frightened me to see it.

"Dermod Flynn has killed the master!" cried a little girl whose name was Norah Ryan and who belonged to the same class as myself.

I was almost certain that I had murdered him, for he dropped down on the form by the wall without speaking a word and placed both his hands over his face. For a wee bit I stood looking at him; then I caught up my cap and rushed out of the school.

Next day, had it not been for the red mark on his face, the master was as well as ever. But I never went back to school again. My father did not believe much in book learning, so he sent me out to work for the neighbours who required help at the seed-time or harvest. Sixpence a day was my wages, and the work in the fields was more to my liking than the work at the school.

Whenever I passed the scholars on the road afterwards they said to one another: "Just think of it! Dermod Flynn struck the master across the face when he was at the school."

Always I felt very proud of my action when I heard them say that. It was a great thing for a boy of my age to stand up on his feet and strike a man who was four times his age. Even the young men spoke of my action and, what was more, they praised my courage. They had been at school themselves and they did not like the experience.

Nowadays, whenever I look at Corsica on