Irish Fairy and Folk Tales

by Edited

  “That’s not true for you,” said one of the little fairies who had scampered off at the approach of the priest, coming up to Dermod Leary with a whole throng of companions at his heels; “there was only a dozen and a half of us pulling against you.”

  Dermod gazed on the tiny speaker with wonder, who continued, “Make yourself noways uneasy about the priest’s supper; for if you will go back and ask him one question from us, there will be as fine a supper as ever was put on a table spread out before him in less than no time.”

  “I’ll have nothing at all to do with you,” replied Dermod in a tone of determination; and after a pause he added, “I’m much obliged to you for your offer, sir, but I know better than to sell myself to you, or the like of you, for a supper; and more than that, I know Father Horrigan has more regard for my soul than to wish me to pledge it for ever, out of regard to anything you could put before him—so there’s an end of the matter.”

  The little speaker, with a pertinacity not to be repulsed by Dermod’s manner, continued, “Will you ask the priest one civil question for us?”

  Dermod considered for some time, and he was right in doing so, but he thought that no one could come to harm out of asking a civil question. “I see no objection to do that same, gentlemen,” said Dermod; “but I will have nothing in life to do with your supper—mind that.”

  “Then,” said the little speaking fairy, while the rest came crowding after him from all parts, “go and ask Father Horrigan to tell us whether our souls will be saved at the last day, like the souls of good Christians; and if you wish us well, bring back word what he says without delay.”

  Away went Dermod to his cabin, where he found the potatoes thrown out on the table, and his good woman handing the biggest of them all, a beautiful laughing red apple, smoking like a hard-ridden horse on a frosty night, over to Father Horrigan.

  “Please your reverence,” said Dermod, after some hesitation, “may I make bold to ask your honor one question?”

  “What may that be?” said Father Horrigan.

  “Why, then, begging your reverence’s pardon for my freedom, it is, If the souls of the good people are to be saved at the last day?”

  “Who bid you ask me that question, Leary?” said the priest, fixing his eyes upon him very sternly, which Dermod could not stand before at all.

  “I’ll tell no lies about the matter, and nothing in life but the truth,” said Dermod. “It was the good people themselves who sent me to ask the question, and there they are in thousands down on the bank of the river, waiting for me to go back with the answer.”

  “Go back by all means,” said the priest, “and tell them, if they want to know, to come here to me themselves, and I’ll answer that or any other question they are pleased to ask with the greatest pleasure in life.”

  Dermod accordingly returned to the fairies, who came swarming round about him to hear what the priest had said in reply; and Dermod spoke out among them like a bold man as he was: but when they heard that they must go to the priest, away they fled, some here and more there, and some this way and more that, whisking by poor Dermod so fast and in such numbers that he was quite bewildered.

  When he came to himself, which was not for a long time, back he went to his cabin, and ate his dry potatoes along with Father Horrigan, who made quite light of the thing; but Dermod could not help thinking it a mighty hard case that his reverence, whose words had the power to banish the fairies at such a rate, should have no sort of relish to his supper, and that the fine salmon he had in the net should have been got away from him in such a manner.

  THE FAIRY WELL OF LAGNANAY

  SAMUEL FERGUSON

  Mournfully, sing mournfully—

  “O listen, Ellen, sister dear:

  Is there no help at all for me,

  But only ceaseless sigh and tear?

  Why did not he who left me here,

  With stolen hope steal memory?

  O listen, Ellen, sister dear:

  (Mournfully, sing mournfully)—

  I’ll go away to Sleamish hill,

  I’ll pluck the fairy hawthorn-tree,

  And let the spirits work their will;

  I care not if for good or ill,

  So they but lay the memory

  Which all my heart is haunting still!

  (Mournfully, sing mournfully)—

  The Fairies are a silent race,

  And pale as lily flowers to see;

  I care not for a blanched face,

  For wandering in a dreaming place,

  So I but banish memory:—

  I wish I were with Anna Grace!”

  Mournfully, sing mournfully!

  Hearken to my tale of woe—

  ’Twas thus to weeping Ellen Con,

  Her sister said in accents low,

  Her only sister, Una bawn:

  ’Twas in their bed before the dawn,

  And Ellen answered sad and slow,—

  “Oh Una, Una, be not drawn

  (Hearken to my tale of woe)—

  To this unholy grief I pray,

  Which makes me sick at heart to know,

  And I will help you if I may:

  —The Fairy Well of Lagnanay—

  Lie nearer me, I tremble so,—

  Una, I’ve heard wise women say

  (Hearken to my tale of woe)—

  That if before the dews arise,

  True maiden in its icy flow

  With pure hand bathe her bosom thrice,

  Three lady-brackens pluck likewise,

  And three times round the fountain go,

  She straight forgets her tears and sighs.”

  Hearken to my tale of woe!

  All, alas! and well-away!

  “Oh, sister Ellen, sister sweet,

  Come with me to the hill I pray,

  And I will prove that blessed freet!”

  They rose with soft and silent feet,

  They left their mother where she lay,

  Their mother and her care discreet,

  (All, alas! and well-away!)

  And soon they reached the Fairy Well,

  The mountain’s eye, clear, cold, and grey,

  Wide open in the dreary fell:

  How long they stood ’twere vain to tell,

  At last upon the point of day,

  Bawn Una bares her bosom’s swell,

  (All, alas! and well-away!)

  Thrice o’er her shrinking breasts she laves

  The gliding glance that will not stay

  Of subtly-streaming fairy waves:—

  And now the charm three brackens craves,

  She plucks them in their fring’d array:—

  Now round the well her fate she braves,

  All, alas! and well-away!

  Save us all from Fairy thrall!

  Ellen sees her face the rim

  Twice and thrice, and that is all—

  Fount and hill and maiden swim

  All together melting dim!

  “Una! Una!” thou may’st call,

  Sister sad! but lith or limb

  (Save us all from Fairy thrall!)

  Never again of Una bawn,

  Where now she walks in dreamy hall,

  Shall eye of mortal look upon!

  Oh! can it be the guard was gone,

  The better guard than shield or wall?

  Who knows on earth save Jurlagh Daune?

  (Save us all from Fairy thrall!)

  Behold the banks are green and bare,

  No pit is here wherein to fall:

  Aye—at the fount you well may stare,

  But naught save pebbles smooth is there,

  And small straws twirling one and all.

  Hie thee home, and be thy pray’r,

  Save us all from Fairy thrall.

  TEIG O’KANE (TADHG O CATHAN)

  AND THE CORPSE*

  LITERALLY TRANSLATED FROM THE IRISH BY DOUGLAS HYDE

  [I found it hard to place Mr. Douglas Hyde’s magnif
icent story. Among the ghosts or the fairies? It is among the fairies on the grounds that all these ghosts and bodies were in no manner ghosts and bodies, but pishogues—fairy spells. One often hears of these visions in Ireland. I have met a man who had lived a wild life like the man in the story, till a vision came to him in County—one dark night—in no way so terrible a vision as this, but sufficient to change his whole character. He will not go out at night. If you speak to him suddenly he trembles. He has grown timid and strange. He went to the bishop and was sprinkled with holy water. “It may have come as a warning,” said the bishop; “yet great theologians are of opinion that no man ever saw an apparition, for no man would survive it.”—ED.]

  There was once a grown-up lad in the County Leitrim, and he was strong and lively, and the son of a rich farmer. His father had plenty of money, and he did not spare it on the son. Accordingly, when the boy grew up he liked sport better than work, and, as his father had no other children, he loved this one so much that he allowed him to do in everything just as it pleased himself. He was very extravagant, and he used to scatter the gold money as another person would scatter the white. He was seldom to be found at home, but if there was a fair, or a race, or a gathering within ten miles of him, you were dead certain to find him there. And he seldom spent a night in his father’s house, but he used to be always out rambling, and, like Shawn Bwee long ago, there was

  “grádh gach cailin i mbrollach a léine,”

  “the love of every girl in the breast of his shirt,” and it’s many’s the kiss he got and he gave, for he was very handsome, and there wasn’t a girl in the country but would fall in love with him, only for him to fasten his two eyes on her, and it was for that someone made this rann on him—

  “Feuch an rógaire ’g iarraidh póige,

  Ni h-iongantas mór é a bheith mar atá

  Ag leanamhaint a geómhnuidhe d’árnán na gráineóige

  Anuas ’s anios ’s nna chodladh ’sa’ lá.”

  i.e.—

  “Look at the rogue, it’s for kisses he’s rambling.

  It isn’t much wonder, for that was his way;

  He’s like an old hedgehog, at night he’ll be scrambling

  From this place to that, but he’ll sleep in the day.”

  At last he became very wild and unruly. He wasn’t to be seen day nor night in his father’s house, but always rambling or going on his kailee (night-visit) from place to place and from house to house, so that the old people used to shake their heads and say to one another, “it’s easy seen what will happen to the land when the old man dies; his son will run through it in a year, and it won’t stand him that long itself.”

  He used to be always gambling and card-playing and drinking, but his father never minded his bad habits, and never punished him. But it happened one day that the old man was told that the son had ruined the character of a girl in the neighborhood, and he was greatly angry, and he called the son to him, and said to him, quietly and sensibly—“Avic,” says he, “you know I loved you greatly up to this, and I never stopped you from doing your choice thing whatever it was, and I kept plenty of money with you, and I always hoped to leave you the house and land, and all I had after myself would be gone; but I heard a story of you to-day that has disgusted me with you. I cannot tell you the grief that I felt when I heard such a thing of you, and I tell you now plainly that unless you marry that girl I’ll leave house and land and everything to my brother’s son. I never could leave it to anyone who would make so bad a use of it as you do yourself, deceiving women and coaxing girls. Settle with yourself now whether you’ll marry that girl and get my land as a fortune with her, or refuse to marry her and give up all that was coming to you; and tell me in the morning which of the two things you have chosen.”

  “Och! Domnoo Sheery! father, you wouldn’t say that to me, and I such a good son as I am. Who told you I wouldn’t marry the girl?” says he.

  But his father was gone, and the lad knew well enough that he would keep his word too; and he was greatly troubled in his mind, for as quiet and as kind as the father was, he never went back of a word that he had once said, and there wasn’t another man in the country who was harder to bend than he was.

  The boy did not know rightly what to do. He was in love with the girl indeed, and he hoped to marry her some time or other, but he would much sooner have remained another while as he was, and follow on at his old tricks—drinking, sporting, and playing cards; and, along with that, he was angry that his father should order him to marry, and should threaten him if he did not do it.

  “Isn’t my father a great fool!” says he to himself. “I was ready enough, and only too anxious, to marry Mary; and now since he threatened me, faith I’ve a great mind to let it go another while.”

  His mind was so much excited that he remained between two notions as to what he should do. He walked out into the night at last to cool his heated blood, and went on to the road. He lit a pipe, and as the night was fine he walked and walked on, until the quick pace made him begin to forget his trouble. The night was bright, and the moon half full. There was not a breath of wind blowing, and the air was calm and mild. He walked on for nearly three hours, when he suddenly remembered that it was late in the night, and time for him to turn. “Musha! I think I forgot myself,” says he; “it must be near twelve o’clock now.”

  The word was hardly out of his mouth, when he heard the sound of many voices, and the trampling of feet on the road before him. “I don’t know who can be out so late at night as this, and on such a lonely road,” said he to himself.

  He stood listening, and he heard the voices of many people talking through other, but he could not understand what they were saying. “Oh, wirra!” says he, “I’m afraid. It’s not Irish or English they have; it can’t be they’re Frenchmen!” He went on a couple of yards further, and he saw well enough by the light of the moon a band of little people coming toward him, and they were carrying something big and heavy with them.

  “Oh, murder!” says he to himself, “sure it can’t be that they’re the good people that’s in it!” Every rib of hair that was on his head stood up, and there fell a shaking on his bones, for he saw that they were coming to him fast.

  He looked at them again, and perceived that there were about twenty little men in it, and there was not a man at all of them higher than about three feet or three feet and a half, and some of them were gray, and seemed very old. He looked again, but he could not make out what was the heavy thing they were carrying until they came up to him, and then they all stood round about him. They threw the heavy thing down on the road, and he saw on the spot that it was a dead body.

  He became as cold as the Death, and there was not a drop of blood running in his veins when an old little gray maneen came up to him and said, “Isn’t it lucky we met you, Teig O’Kane?”

  Poor Teig could not bring out a word at all, nor open his lips, if he were to get the world for it, and so he gave no answer.

  “Teig O’Kane,” said the little gray man again, “isn’t it timely you met us?”

  Teig could not answer him.

  “Teig O’Kane,” says he, “the third time, isn’t it lucky and timely that we met you?”

  But Teig remained silent, for he was afraid to return an answer, and his tongue was as if it was tied to the roof of his mouth.

  The little gray man turned to his companions, and there was joy in his bright little eye. “And now,” says he, “Teig O’Kane hasn’t a word, we can do with him what we please. Teig, Teig,” says he, “you’re living a bad life, and we can make a slave of you now, and you cannot withstand us, for there’s no use in trying to go against us. Lift that corpse.”

  Teig was so frightened that he was only able to utter the two words, “I won’t”; for as frightened as he was, he was obstinate and stiff, the same as ever.

  “Teig O’Kane won’t lift the corpse,” said the little maneen, with a wicked little laugh, for all the world like the breaking of a lock
of dry kippeens, and with a little harsh voice like the striking of a cracked bell. “Teig O’Kane won’t lift the corpse—make him lift it;” and before the word was out of his mouth they had all gathered round poor Teig, and they all talking and laughing through other.

  Teig tried to run from them, but they followed him, and a man of them stretched out his foot before him as he ran, so that Teig was thrown in a heap on the road. Then before he could rise up the fairies caught him, some by the hands and some by the feet, and they held him tight, in a way that he could not stir, with his face against the ground. Six or seven of them raised the body then, and pulled it over to him, and left it down on his back. The breast of the corpse was squeezed against Teig’s back and shoulders, and the arms of the corpse were thrown around Teig’s neck. Then they stood back from him a couple of yards, and let him get up. He rose, foaming at the mouth and cursing, and he shook himself, thinking to throw the corpse off his back. But his fear and his wonder were great when he found that the two arms had a tight hold round his own neck, and that the two legs were squeezing his hips firmly, and that, however strongly he tried, he could not throw it off, any more than a horse can throw off its saddle. He was terribly frightened then, and he thought he was lost. “Ochone! for ever,” said he to himself, “it’s the bad life I’m leading that has given the good people this power over me. I promise to God and Mary, Peter and Paul, Patrick and Bridget, that I’ll mend my ways for as long as I have to live, if I come clear out of this danger—and I’ll marry the girl.”

  The little gray man came up to him again, and said he to him, “Now, Teigeen,” says he, “you didn’t lift the body when I told you to lift it, and see how you were made to lift it; perhaps when I tell you to bury it you won’t bury it until you’re made to bury it!”