The next time he was writing to Finn's mother his grandfather added this to the letter:

"My dear daughter—Finn has grown big and he wants to wear gossoon's clothes. We would buy him a suit, only we think it should be his mother that would put the first boy's suit upon him. If it was you sent him the clothes from America Finn would be the more proud to wear them."

When Finn's mother wrote back, she said she had bought him a boy's suit and that Mary Gartland would bring it when she was going home in July.

You may be sure that Finn was excited by the news. When would July be?—he asked his grandfather. How many Sundays more would it be,—he asked his grandmother,—until Mary Gartland would be home with the suit? On the day the letter came his grandmother was putting a hatching hen upon a clutch of eggs. When the chickens were hatched out of the eggs, and a while after that, she told him it would be July.

Finn often watched where the hen was hatching. He would wait until she got off her nest and look at the eggs. But he saw no sign of change on them. At last there were marks where they were chipped by the birds within. Finn got up early next morning and came to the nest. Shells were laid outside it. He pushed his hands under the hen and found little chickens alive beneath her wings. But still it was a week and three days until Mary Gartland would be home.

There were many young women back from America, and Finn could recognize them by their hats. When he saw one on the road he would wait for her to come up to him or he would run on to catch up to her, expecting that she would speak to him, telling him that she was Mary Gartland and that the suit sent him was at her house.

The next Sunday at the chapel he saw another girl back from America. This time he was sure it was Mary Gartland.

"Grandmother," he said, "there's Mary Gartland."

But he spoke at a very solemn part of the mass and his grandmother bade him kneel down and not let his mind be distracted.

When they were seated again Finn said, "Isn't that Mary Gartland, grandmother?" It was she, sure enough. She waited outside the chapel to give her messages from Finn's mother.

"And," said she, "I have a suit in my trunk for a little boy. I presume this is the little boy."

That evening Finn went over to Gartlands'. Mary was out to see the neighbours and the boy had to wait—he was very impatient—until she came in. The suit was taken out of the trunk and given him. When Finn got outside the door with the parcel under his arm he ran and ran and ran. He thought he should never reach his grandfather's.

"You can put the suit on you in the morning, Finn," his grandfather said.

But Finn had not run the whole way to sit down now, to go to bed, and to sleep, with the parcel unopened.

"I want to put on my suit," he whispered to his grandmother.

"And we'll let you put it on tonight," she whispered.

She had spun wool and knitted high worsted stockings and had made a linen shirt for him against the time he should get his boy's clothes. Now she took the suit and the shirt and into the room and dressed Finn in his first boy's suit.

He felt so delighted that he could not stay within the house. So he slipped out and ran down to the field where the men and boys were raking the hay. He thought they might fail to give enough notice and as he ran over to them he shouted, "A ghost, a ghost, a ghost." And then he shouted out, "Do you see a gossoon?" But they only said, "It's little Finn O'Donnell." Then one of the men cried, "By the Mortal! Finn O'Donnell is a gossoon now." One of the boys said, "You're a gossoon now, Finn, and you'll have to rake the hay for us."

Finn took up the rake and began to work vigorously. But when he saw they had ceased to be excited about his suit he laid down the rake and slipped away. Coming near the house he caught up with the gander that was leading the young geese on their march home. In his delight and excitement Finn went to drive the geese. Thereupon the gander raced at him, threw him down, nipped his legs and beat him with his wings, and then marched off with his head held high; the whole band of admiring geese followed him. Finn went into the house very quietly. He never told how ignominiously he had been beaten on the evening he became a gossoon.