Eamon Kelly

by Eamon Kelly

  It was the night of a threshing I went out in my first set dance. I was still a schoolboy in short pants, but I had been watching the dancers for a long time in the houses and at the Sunday evening dancing deck near Mac’s Arch. People said I had dancing in my feet from the way I used to tap out the time to the music. I knew the figures of the polka set; the jig set, I thought, was a little more complicated. I’d never have had the courage to go out only that my father said he’d make up the three other men to stand in the middle of the floor. I stood opposite my father so that he would be my co-dancer in certain figures of the set. As we stood there we talked for a while, as was the custom. Then we asked our partners.

  The girls, all eager to shake a leg, had their eyes on the men on the floor There was no formal request. The women responded to a nod or a wink. I thought this method a bit too grown up for me and I walked to the side and said to a young woman who was a good dancer, ‘Will you dance, please?’ When the music struck up the women came and stood by the men’s right hand. My partner guided me and told me what was coming next in each figure of the set. I became so confident after a while that like my father and the other dancers I added a little embellishment to the step. A bit of heel and toe work. The first time I did this a cheer went up in the kitchen and shouts of ‘’Tis kind father for you!’

  I danced many a set after and pounded many a stone-flagged kitchen at station dance or on threshing night, but the first time I squared out with my father standing opposite me remains the clearest in my mind. Mick and Brian Kelly had a concertina which they played in turn. It was Mick who played for our set, polka tunes for the first three figures and then ‘Pop goes the Weasel’ for the slide. In this figure my father and his partner danced towards my partner and me. We met them halfway, did some fancy footwork and retreated. Then forward to meet them again, our right feet hitting the floor in perfect timing. The music gathered speed as we danced to form a square and this went into a swing. The swing, or wheel as it is called, is a tricky thing to get right. The dancer pivots on one foot and wheels his partner around him. Faster and faster we went to keep up with Mick Kelly’s music until my head swam as the dancers’ faces and the entire kitchen, floor, ceiling and fire went into a mad spin around me. People cheered, egging on the musician. I lost my footing and as the legs were taken from under me, I landed on my backside on the floor, my head still spinning. I must have fainted because I could hear the loud laughter fading as if the wireless were suddenly turned down. My father’s face and the faces of the dancers bobbed up and down in my mind’s eye, twirling and swirling and turning different colours until they melted into darkness.

  Gradually I heard the voices coming back. When I came to I was sitting on a chair and someone was holding a cup of water to my lips. I took a long drink, shook myself and stood up. ‘I am all right,’ I said to the many enquiries as to how I felt. My father wanted to take me home. No, I was feeling fine. And I was. When the dancers lined out for the final figure in the set I took my place. Mick Kelly didn’t race the music and my partner took care that we didn’t overdo the dancing. After the dance there was a cup of tea and I was right as rain. On the way home my father talked about what had happened. He was anxious about me, and we decided not to tell my mother. She would be very troubled if she heard that I fell in a faint in my first set dance. She always held I did not have the sturdiness of other young lads of my age and that anything over-strenuous would knock the wind out of me.

  They were all in bed when we went home. ‘A nice hour to have him out!’ my mother complained to my father. I got into bed beside my brother, worn out from the dancing and helping at the threshing. As I fell asleep the events of the day ran through my mind. Stacks of corn going down and the síogóg and the straw rick going up. The movement from hand to hand as the sheaves of corn found their way to the thresher, the black smoke belching from the engine and boo-ooo-ooo of the machine mingling with the racing music of Mick Kelly’s concertina. I don’t remember going to sleep and it seemed as if only minutes had elapsed when my mother called me and my brother for school. When I came downstairs I dashed the cold water on my face and dried myself. I put my lunch in my coat pocket and brought my strap of books to the table. As I sat down opposite my father my mother looked at me anxiously.

  ‘He was talking in his sleep,’ she said to my father, ‘Did anything happen to him?’

  My father was taking the top off a boiled egg and putting a dust of salt in it. He said, ‘These eggs are hardly done, Hannah.’

  BY TRAIN TO THE SEASIDE

  In my last year at school and coming up to the summer holidays the master put forward the idea of a school outing. ‘Hands up,’ he said, ‘all of you who have been to the seaside?’ Not a single hand went up. None of us had ever seen the sea. In fact very few of the older generation had seen it, though my mother, before she married, was on an excursion to Youghal. The sea was a mystery as far as we were concerned and we were delighted when the master announced that he would take the upper classes to Rossbeigh the week before we closed for the summer. He thought that the infants and first and second classes were too small to take them on such a long journey. We agreed with him. And as Sullivan from Ballaugh said to me, ‘What do they want there for!’ We were very excited at the news. ‘Calm down,’ he told us. ‘This outing will cost money.’ There would be the train fare and expenses for the day. Not too much. We could bring our lunch the same as if we were coming to school and get a cup of tea there. He told us what the train fare was and he told us to collect this and bring it to school.

  I was up early on the appointed morning. I got into my best clothes, my confirmation suit. Boots, stockings and a skullcap completed the outfit. We had seven and sixpence between my brother and myself, and my father slipped us a two-shilling piece which I think my mother didn’t know about. She warned us to be wary of the sea and if we went paddling not to go out too far. My father drove us to Killarney railway station in the pony and trap and we picked up a few boys on the road who didn’t have a drive. We were away too early for the train and the time was spent running up and down the platform and counting the boys every now and then to see who was missing. As sure as anything, we said, someone would be late. But they were all there when the train came puffing in from Cork. We were lined up and the master shepherded us into whatever vacant carriages he could find when the Killarney passengers got out. There were no corridors. Each compartment had two seats running the entire width of the carriage. Once you were in and the train moved off you had to stay there, but you could change to another compartment when the train stopped at a station.

  It was everyone’s first time on a train. We soon got the hang of how to work the leather strap to lever the windows up and down, so that as many of us as could fit were looking out both windows when the train got to Ballyhar. The master got out there and ran along the platform to see that we were all right. He warned us to keep the windows up in case we’d fall out. At Farranfore we all got off and changed to another train. Such excitement! We were like sheep set free from a pen. When everyone had settled down I took my place at the window and watched the guard wave his green flag. He blew on his whistle and with a chug, chug, chug, the train was off. He ran a few steps with the train and then hopped on to the end carriage.

  We halted at Killorglin and we promised ourselves that when we were bigger and owned bicycles we would cycle here to the famous Puck Fair held each year on 11 August. At the next station the guard alighted and shouted, ‘Mollahive!’ but no one got out or got in. It was full steam ahead to Glenbeigh. All out and into line but a few of us ran forward to have a look at the engine. The furnace door was open and the stoker shovelled coal into the glowing fire, darkening the glow momentarily. When the stoker shut the door the driver put his hand on a lever and a huge jet of steam shot up. There followed a whistle. We got back into line and watched the train gather speed on its way out of the station to Kells and Cahirciveen.

  The master, as pious a man as you cou
ld meet, marched us out of the platform and into the chapel to say a prayer. Going up the aisle, Sullivan from Ballaugh suddenly genuflected prior to entering a seat and I, not expecting the genuflection and walking close behind, was thrown out over him. This brought more than a titter from the rest of the class. The master’s face clouded at such a display of mirth in a holy place and when we came out we were spoken to very severely. Cafflers, a great word of his, he called us. As we walked down towards the fork in the road where we would turn right for Rossbeigh our hearts sank. A mist started to come down. As we walked along, the fog got thicker and when we arrived on Rossbeigh Strand the master was panic-stricken as our vision was now only a couple of yards. The master was afraid that some of us might stray away and get lost. He collected us in a bunch and warned us to watch him and not to move anywhere unless he was in eye view. We were down in the dumps with depression at having come all the way for a glimpse of the sea and now that we were standing on the strand it was nowhere to be seen.

  There was movement in the mist. It seemed to be blown in from the ocean. Sometimes it thinned out and then got so thick you could hardly see the boy next to you. We kept our eyes peeled for the master’s black hat, and he kept talking loudly so that if we couldn’t see him we knew where he was. Even though a vision of the sea was denied us we were conscious of its presence from the sound of the waves and the smell of the seaside. The master had an idea. We all moved back from where we perceived the sea was and sat on the dry sand and on a heap of stones. He called the roll – everyone was present – and he suggested that we should wait in the hope that the mist would clear, and while we were waiting as it was a long time since breakfast we would eat our lunches. Afterwards he would arrange that we got a cup of tea. As we sat and ate, maybe it was a prayer the master said or maybe it was our visit to the chapel, but the mist got lighter. We took off our shoes and stockings and placed them on the stones and ever so gradually the sea came into view. Only the white surf on top of the waves at first as they chased each other to the shore. When it was clear enough and the master gave the signal, we raced barefoot towards the water’s edge. We stopped and watched the waves rush in towards us only to peter out on the sand and flow back into the sea again. The game now was to run after the receding wave and turn quickly so that it didn’t catch us as we ran back. We weren’t always successful.

  The water felt cold at first but after a time we didn’t feel it. By pulling up our short pants we paddled in as far as we could and when we got tired of that we raced up the strand and the dry sand stuck to our feet and shins. We found if we sat for a while on the bank of stones the sand dried, little particles of it glistening in the sun, which was now coming out. By rubbing our feet with our hands we got the sand off.

  The master said what about a cup of tea. No one found any fault with that. We put on our shoes and stockings and went to an eating house perched over the strand. The lady of the house had a huge teapot as big as a kettle and she filled out a mug of tea for each one of us. There were tables with milk and sugar and chairs where we could sit. The master paid her for the tea and said we could have a second mug if we felt like it. There was a shop at the end of the dining-room. This was a chance for us to spend our money. We bought buns, cakes and fat biscuits, and even though it was only a little over an hour since we had our lunch we sat down to a royal feast. Afterwards we bought tómhaisíns (conical paper measures) of sweets, bullseyes and NKM toffees.

  When we got back to the strand the master talked to us about the sea. He explained the coming and going of the tide and how the waters were influenced by the pull of the moon. He showed us the nets laid out upon the rocks and how a fish working its way through a hole was caught by the fins and held a prisoner. He told us the names of the fish that were netted along the coast, and as the sky cleared the day got warmer and we saw black shapes rolling in the sea. These were porpoises. We wondered would there be any chance we’d see a whale or a shark, but wherever these animals were that day they kept far away from Rossbeigh. Outside where the waves rolled on to the shore the sea was like a sheet of blue glass stretched away to where it met the sky. We were delighted with the variety of seashells and we collected some to bring home to show the smaller members of the family. I got one huge white shell something in the shape of the house the snail carries on his back but miles bigger. The master said if I put it in my ear I could hear the sound of the sea. I brought it home and showed it to the neighbours. They put it to their ears and swore they could hear the sea quite plainly.

  The master suggested that we play games and enjoy the sun. Some of the boys had a football but a party of us opted to play ducks off. This was a favourite game which we played at home or by the roadside on our way from school. We selected a big stone with a flat top from the bank and positioned it on the sand. This was the granny. We marked the throwing point about twenty feet back from it. Each player picked a stone about a pound in weight and this was his duck. One boy, a volunteer, placed his duck on the granny. He was the granny man. The others in turn threw their ducks at it, the aim being to knock it off. When a good shot knocked it from the granny there was a mad scramble by the other players to retrieve their ducks from behind the granny. The granny man replaced his duck as quickly as he could, and having done this if he succeeded in touching a boy before he got back to the mark that boy’s duck went on the granny. And so the game was played. Every boy as he threw the stone had to shout ‘ducks off!’ If he omitted to say it the penalty was that his duck went on the granny. It sounds a very dangerous game with all those stones flying, but it wasn’t. All the players had to remain behind the mark while the ducks were being thrown.

  In time there was an argument. A player claimed that he wasn’t really caught before he got back to the mark. This led to a row and the master had to intervene. ‘No more rounders!’ he said. That was his name for ducks off. We turned our attention to the sea, and noticed that while we were in the eating house and playing ducks off the waves had receded. The water was away out now and we had to race down to it. There were round jelly-like platters on the sand. The master said if we stood on one of those jellyfish we might get a sting. The very big ones which he called Portuguese men o’war were especially dangerous. We were disappointed we didn’t see any fish but we did take stock of the birds. They were very different from the crows, pigeons, blackbirds and thrushes which we saw at home. Most noticeable were the white herring gulls with grey backs. They swirled and screamed overhead and landed on the sea. In a way I envied a creature that could walk on land and fly and swim. To my mind that was a form of complete freedom. There were smaller gull-like birds called terns. We had the master bothered asking him the names of the different species. There were very small birds keeping in flocks with a smart walk like a wagtail when they landed and only a short butt of a tail. These were sandpipers.

  All in all it was a great day. The one regret we had was that nobody told us about bathing suits. The master never said a word. Maybe he didn’t want our mothers going to the expense of buying togs and our using them only once. We would have dearly loved to strip off and dive into the sea and frolic around in the water like we saw some other children do. We really envied them and the bathers running against the high incoming waves and being covered over for an instant and then washed in towards the shore. We saw men swim out to sea and I was as jealous of them as I was of the seagulls who had the best of three worlds. I was firmly planted in one.

  It was time to head back for the village of Glenbeigh. On our way past the eating house we saw a woman in a white apron selling sea grass. We decided to invest in a pennyworth. It was of a purple shade and tasted very bitter and salty but after a time we got used to chewing it. We weren’t too keen on swallowing the sea grass so when it was all chewed up we spat it out. The master thought our conduct was disgusting. We went back and bought another few pennyworths of it to bring home. When we reached the village I counted my money and with what we had left my brother and I bought sweets f
or those at home and a barmbrack type cake for my mother. The train came into the station. When the engine stopped, steam seemed to escape through every bit of it. We climbed in and when the porter banged the door shut and the guard waved his green flag and blew his whistle the train chuffed out and we all began to sing. Sullivan from Ballaugh had two lines of a song which went:

  We came to see sights that would dazzle the eye,

  But all that we saw was the mountain and sky!

  And we chimed in with,

  We saw the sea, ah ha, ah ha, we saw the sea!

  When we changed trains at Farranfore my brother and I broke company and joined with the boys in another compartment to see what the fun was like. Not so good. They were mostly a crowd from Minish and one of them got sick after chewing too much sea grass. We had to pull the leather strap very quick so that he could put his head out the window. With every heave we all went ‘Aaaah!’ to give him encouragement. His brother took umbrage at this and a row developed. They shouted at us, ‘Bealach an chabáiste!’ (Ballaugh of the cabbage; market gardening was a sideline by the small farmers there) and we shouted at them, ‘Minish hold the bag!’ In no time the dukes were up and fists flew. Even the sick man turned from the window and joined in the melêe. There would have been skin and hair flying only that the train stopped at Ballyhar. My brother and I got out and joined the Ballaugh crowd in another carriage for what turned out to be an uneventful final run into Killarney.