faint blaze; at the same instant a sudden gust whisked off the
stranger's hat, and the sexton beheld that his skull was roofless. For
an instant he beheld the gaping aperture, black and shattered, and then
he fell senseless into his own doorway, which his affrighted wife had
just unbarred.

I need hardly give my reader the key to this most intelligible and
authentic narrative. The traveller was acknowledged by all to have been
the spectre of the suicide, called up by the Evil One to tempt the
convivial sexton into a violation of his promise, sealed, as it was, by
an imprecation. Had he succeeded, no doubt the dusky steed, which Bob had
seen saddled in attendance, was destined to have carried back a double
burden to the place from whence he came.

As an attestation of the reality of this visitation, the old thorn tree
which overhung the doorway was found in the morning to have been blasted
with the infernal fires which had issued from the bottle, just as if a
thunder-bolt had scorched it.

The moral of the above tale is upon the surface, apparent, and, so to
speak, _self-acting_--a circumstance which happily obviates the
necessity of our discussing it together. Taking our leave, therefore, of
honest Bob Martin, who now sleeps soundly in the same solemn dormitory
where, in his day, he made so many beds for others, I come to a legend
of the Royal Irish Artillery, whose headquarters were for so long a time
in the town of Chapelizod. I don't mean to say that I cannot tell a
great many more stories, equally authentic and marvellous, touching this
old town; but as I may possibly have to perform a like office for other
localities, and as Anthony Poplar is known, like Atropos, to carry a
shears, wherewith to snip across all "yarns" which exceed reasonable