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Once upon a time there dwelt in the land of Erin a young man who
was seeking a wife, and of all the maidens round about none
pleased him as well as the only daughter of a farmer. The girl
was willing and the father was willing, and very soon they were
married and went to live at the farm. By and bye the season came
when they must cut the peats and pile them up to dry, so that
they might have fires in the winter. So on a fine day the girl
and her husband, and the father and his wife all went out upon
the moor.
They worked hard for many hours, and at length grew hungry, so
the young woman was sent home to bring them food, and also to
give the horses their dinner. When she went into the stables, she
suddenly saw the heavy pack-saddle of the speckled mare just over
her head, and she jumped and said to herself:
'Suppose that pack-saddle were to fall and kill me, how dreadful
it would be!' and she sat down just under the pack-saddle she was
so much afraid of, and began to cry.
Now the others out on the moor grew hungrier and hungrier.
'What can have become of her?' asked they, and at length the
mother declared that she would wait no longer, and must go and
see what had happened.
As the bride was nowhere in the kitchen or the dairy, the old
woman went into the stable, where she found her daughter weeping
bitterly.
'What is the matter, my dove?' and the girl answered, between her
sobs:
'When I came in and saw the pack-saddle over my head, I thought
how dreadful it would be if it fell and killed me,' and she cried
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Fairytales 
