They had not been long in this beautiful
castle, when she one day presented herself
in the chamber in which her husband
studied his forbidden art, and there
implored him to exhibit before her some of
the wonders of his evil science.  He
resisted long; but her entreaties, tears, and
wheedlings were at length too much for
him, and he consented.

But before beginning those astonishing
transformations with which he was about
to amaze her, he explained to her the
awful conditions and dangers of the
experiment.

Alone in this vast apartment, the walls
of which were lapped, far below, by the lake
whose dark waters lay waiting to swallow
them, she must witness a certain series of
frightful phenomena, which, once commenced,
he could neither abridge nor mitigate;
and if throughout their ghastly succession
she spoke one word, or uttered one
exclamation, the castle and all that it contained
would in one instant subside to the
bottom of the lake, there to remain, under
the servitude of a strong spell, for ages.

The dauntless curiosity of the lady having
prevailed, and the oaken door of the study
being locked and barred, the fatal
experiments commenced.

Muttering a spell, as he stood before her,
feathers sprouted thickly over him, his face
became contracted and hooked, a cadaverous
smell filled the air, and, with heavy winnowing
wings, a gigantic vulture rose in his
stead, and swept round and round the room,
as if on the point of pouncing upon her.

The lady commanded herself through this
trial, and instantly another began.

The bird alighted near the door, and in less
than a minute changed, she saw not how,
into a horribly deformed and dwarfish hag:
who, with yellow skin hanging about her
face, and enormous eyes, swung herself on
crutches toward the lady, her mouth foaming
with fury, and her grimaces and contortions
becoming more and more hideous
every moment, till she rolled with a yell on
the floor, in a horrible convulsion, at the
lady's feet, and then changed into a huge
serpent, which came sweeping and arching
toward her, with crest erect, and quivering
tongue.  Suddenly, as it seemed on
the point of darting at her, she saw her
husband in its stead, standing pale before
her, and, with his finger on his lip, enforcing
the continued necessity of silence.  He then
placed himself at his length on the floor,
and began to stretch himself out and out,
longer and longer, until his head nearly
reached to one end of the vast room, and
his feet to the other.

This horror overcame her. The ill-starred
lady uttered a wild scream, whereupon
the castle and all that was within it,
sank in a moment to the bottom of the lake.

But, once in every seven years, by night,
the Earl of Desmond and his retinue emerge,
and cross the lake, in shadowy cavalcade.
His white horse is shod with silver.  On
that one night, the earl may ride till daybreak,
and it behoves him to make good
use of his time; for, until the silver shoes of
his steed be worn through, the spell that
holds him and his beneath the lake, will
retain its power.

When I (Miss Anne Baily) was a child,
there was still living a man named Teigne
O'Neill, who had a strange story to tell.

He was a smith, and his forge stood on
the brow of the hill, overlooking the lake,
on a lonely part of the road to Cahir Conlish.
  One bright moonlight night, he was
working very late, and quite alone.  The
clink of his hammer, and the wavering
glow reflected through the open door on
the bushes at the other side of the narrow
road, were the only tokens that told of life
and vigil for miles around.

In one of the pauses of his work, he
heard the ring of many hoofs ascending the
steep road that passed his forge, and,
standing in his doorway, he was just in time to
see a gentleman, on a white horse, who was
dressed in a fashion the like of which the
smith had never seen before.  This man was
accompanied and followed by a mounted
retinue, as strangely dressed as he.

They seemed, by the clang and clatter
that announced their approach, to be riding
up the hill at a hard hurry-scurry gallop;
but the pace abated as they drew near, and
the rider of the white horse who, from his
grave and lordly air, he assumed to be a
man of rank, and accustomed to command
drew bridle and came to a halt before the
smith's door.

He did not speak, and all his train were
silent, but he beckoned to the smith, and
pointed down to one of his horse's hoofs.

Teigne stooped and raised it, and held
it just long enough to see that it was shod
with a silver shoe: which, in one place, he
said, was worn as thin as a shilling.
Instantaneously his situation was made
apparent to him by this sign, and he recoiled
with a terrified prayer. The lordly rider,
with a look of pain and fury, struck at
him suddenly, with something that whistled
in the air, like a whip; and an. icy streak