With that the gentleman got down off his horse, and it was an honourable reception they made him. Evenly herself was content to remember the scorn put on poor Shan Alec, when she seen the magnificent suitor was come.
The gentleman had a smile on his face when he heard all the boasts of the farmer.
"My good man," says he, "I think scorn on your money and land, for I'd have you to know that I am a King in my own place. But that girl sitting by the hearth has a lovely white countenance on her, and her heart I am seeking for love of the same."
"Oh mother," says Bride in a whisper, "will you send him away?"
"I'd go through fire and water for my poor Shan Alec!" says Bride.
"Will you hold your whisht," says her mother. "That is no right talk for a well-reared girl."
The farmer and the gentleman made their agreement and opened the bottle of whiskey. There was to be a nice little feast for to celebrate the settlement, and the cloth was set in the parlour on account of the grandeur of the suitor and he not used to a kitchen at all.
When the supper was served didn't the servant girl call the mistress out to the kitchen.
"Oh mam," says she. "I couldn't get word with you in private before. Let you hunt that lad from the place."
"Sure how would he be a right gentleman and he having a foot on him like a horse?" says the girl.
With that the mistress began to lament and to groan.
"What'll I do! What'll I do, and I scared useless with dread?"
"I'll go in and impeach him," says the servant girl.
"Quit off out of this," says she. "We'll have no horse feet in this place."
The master got up to run her from the room.
"Look under the table at your lovely gentleman's foot!" says she.
The farmer done as she bid, but he was that set in his own conceit he just answers:
"What harm is in a reel foot? It's no ornament surely, but that's all there is to it."
"Many's the reel foot I've laid eyes on," she says. "But yon is the hoof of a horse."
"It's truth you are speaking," says the gentleman. "I am the devil and no person less."
"Quit off from here," says the servant. "A decent girl, like us two, need never be fearing your like. I'd hit you a skelp with the pot stick as soon as I'd stand on a worm."
"You can't put me out," says the devil. "For the man of the house has me promised his daughter."