Blair Collection > Beside the fire

THE TAILOR AND THE THREE BEASTS. 7
" Wait there until I come back again," says he.
The tailor went forward the next day, and he had not
walked very far until he met a modder-alla (lion ?) and
the lion greeted him, and asked him where was he going.
" I'm going to Dublin till I make a court for the king
if I'm able to make it," said the tailor.
" If you were to make a plough for me," said the lion,
" I and the other lions could be ploughing and harrowing
until we'd have a bit to eat in the harvest."
" I'll do that for you," said the tailor.
He brought his axe and his saw, and he made a plough.
When the plough was made, he put a hole in the beam of
it, and he said to the lion to go in under the plough till
he'd see was he any good of a ploughman. He placed the
tail in the hole he had made for it, and then clapped in
a peg, and the lion was not able to draw out his tail again.
" Loose me out now," said the lion, " and we'll fix our-
selves and go ploughing."
- The tailor said he would not loose him out, until he
came back himself. He left him there then, and he came
to Dublin.
When he came to Dublin he put forth a paper, desiring
all the tradesmen that were raising the court to come
to him, and that he would pay them ; and at that time
workmen used only to be getting one penny in the day.
A number of tradesmen gathered the next day, and
they began working for him. They were going home
again after their day, when the tailor said to them " to
put up that great stone upon the top of the work that they
had done." When the great stone was raised up, the
tailor put some sort of contrivance under it, that he might
be able to throw it down as soon as the giant would come
as far as it. The work people v;ent home then, and the
tailor went in hiding behind the big stone.