Loose clapboards rattled in the wind; rags fluttered from the broken windows; within doors were tattered children and scanty fare.
The landlord's wife was a stout, buxom woman, of Irish lineage, and, what with scolding her husband and liberally patronizing his bar in his absence, managed to keep, as she said, her "own heart whole," although the same could scarcely be said of her children's trousers and her own frock of homespun.

She confidently predicted that "a betther day was coming," being, in fact, the only thing hopeful about the premises.

And it did come, sure enough.

Not only all the regular travellers on the road made a point of stopping at the tavern, but guests from all the adjacent towns filled its long-deserted rooms,--the secret of which was, that it had somehow got abroad that a company of fairies had taken up their abode in the hostelry and daily held conversation with each other in the capacious parlor.

I have heard those who at the time visited the tavern say that it was literally thronged for several weeks.