when the pagan gods of ireland—the tuath-de-danān—robbed of worship and offerings, grew smaller and smaller in the popular imagination, until they turned into the fairies, the pagan heroes grew bigger and bigger, until they turned into the giants.
“Montaigne and Howell’s letters,” says Thackeray, “are my bedside books. If I wake at night, I have one or other of them to prattle me to sleep again. They tal
