many died there. And one night my father was passing by and he
saw some one standing all in white, and two men beside him, and he
thought he knew one of the men and spoke to him and said "Is that
you, Martin?" but he never spoke nor moved. And as to the thing in
white, he could not say was it man or woman, but my father never went
by that place again at night.
* * * * *
The last person buried in a graveyard has the care of all the other
souls until another is to be buried, and then the soul can go and
shift for itself. It may be a week or a month or a year, but watch
the place it must till another soul comes.
* * * * *
There was a man used to be giving short measure, not giving the full
yard, and one time after his death there was a man passing the river
and the horse he had would not go into it. And he heard the voice
of the tailor saying from the river he had a message to send to his
wife, and to tell her not to be giving short measure, or she would be
sent to the same place as himself. There was a hymn made about that.
* * * * *
There was a woman lived in Rathkane, alone in the house, and she told
me that one night something came and lay over the bed and gave three
great moans. That was all ever she heard in the house.
* * * * *
The shadows of the dead gather round at Samhain time to see is there
any one among their friends saying a few Masses for them.
_An Islander:_
Down there near the point, on the 6th of March, 1883, there was a
curragh upset and five boys were drowned. And a man from County Clare
told me that he was on the coast that day, and that he saw them
walking towards him on the Atlantic.
* * * * *
There is a house down there near the sea, and one day the woman of it
was sitting by the fire, and a little girl came in at the door, and
a red cloak about her, and she sat down by the fire. And the woman
asked her where did she come from, and she said that she had just
come from Connemara. And then she went out, and when she was going
out the door she made herself known to her sister that was standing
in it, and she called out to the mother. And when the mother knew it
was the child she had lost near a year before, she ran out to call
her, for she wouldn't for all the world to have not known her when
she was there. But she was gone and she never came again.
* * * * *
There was this boy's father took a second wife, and he was walking
home one evening, and his wife behind him, and there was a great wind
blowing, and he kept his head stooped down because of the seaweed
coming blowing into his eyes. And she was about twenty paces behind,
and she saw his first wife come and walk close beside him, and he
never saw her, having his head down, but she kept with him near all
the way. And when they got home, she told the husband who was with
him, and with the fright she got she was bad in her bed for two or
three days--do you remember that, Martin? She died after, and he has
a third wife taken now.
* * * * *
I believe all that die are brought among them, except maybe an odd
old person.
_A Kildare Woman:_
There was a woman I knew sent into the Rotunda Hospital for an
operation. And when she was going she cried when she was saying
good-bye to her cousin that was a friend of mine, for she felt in her
that she would not come back again. And she put her two arms about
her going away and said, "If the dead can do any good thing for the
living, I'll do it for you." And she never recovered, but died in
the hospital. And within a few weeks something came on her cousin,
my friend, and they said it was her side that was paralysed, and she
died. And many said it was no common illness, but that it was the
dead woman that had kept to her word.
_A Connemara Man:_
There was a boy in New York was killed by rowdies, they killed him
standing against a lamppost and he was frozen to it, and stood there
till morning. And it is often since that time he was seen in the room
and the passages of the house where he used to be living.
And in the house beyond a woman died, and some other family came to
live in it; but every night she came back and stripped the clothes
off them, so at last they went away.
* * * * *
When some one goes that owes money, the weight of the soul is
more than the weight of the body, and it can't get away and keeps
wandering till some one has courage to question it.
_Mrs. Casey:_
My grandmother told my mother that in her time at Cloughballymore,
there was a woman used to appear in the churchyard of Rathkeale, and
that many boys and girls and children died with the fright they got
when they saw her.
So there was a gentleman living near was very sorry for all the
children dying, and he went to an old woman to ask her was there any
way to do away with the spirit that appeared. So she said if any one
would have courage to go and to question it, he could do away with
it. So the gentleman went at midnight and waited at the churchyard,
and he on his horse, and had a sword with him. So presently the shape
appeared and he called to it and said, "Tell me what you are?" And it
came over to him, and when he saw the face he got such a fright that
he turned the horse's head and galloped away as hard as he could. But
after galloping a long time he looked down and what did he see beside
him but the woman running and her hand on the horse. So he took his
sword and gave a slash at her, and cut through her arm, so that she
gave a groan and vanished, and he went on home.
And when he got to the stable and had the lantern lighted, you may
think what a start he got when he saw the hand still holding on to the
horse, and no power could lift it off. So he went into the house and
said his prayers to Almighty God to take it off. And all night long, he
could hear moaning and crying about the house. And in the morning when
he went out the hand was gone, but all the stable was splashed with
blood. But the woman was never seen in those parts again.
_A Seaside Man:_
And many see the faeries at Knock and there was a carpenter died, and
he could be heard all night in his shed making coffins and carts and
all sorts of things, and the people are afraid to go near it. There
were four boys from Knock drowned five years ago, and often now they
are seen walking on the strand and in the fields and about the village.
* * * * *
There was a man used to go out fowling, and one day his sister said
to him, "Whatever you do don't go out tonight and don't shoot any
wild-duck or any birds you see flying--for tonight they are all poor
souls travelling."
_An Old Man in Galway Workhouse:_
Burke of Carpark's son died, but he used often to be seen going about
afterwards. And one time a herd of his father's met with him and he
said, "Come tonight and help us against the hurlers from the north,
for they have us beat twice, and if they beat us a third time, it
will be a bad year for Ireland."
It was in the daytime they had the hurling match through the streets
of Galway. No one could see them, and no one could go outside the
door while it lasted, for there went such a whirlwind through the
town that you could not look through the window.
And he sent a message to his father that he would find some paper he
was looking for a few days before, behind a certain desk, between
it and the wall, and the father found it there. He would not have
believed it was his son the herd met only for that.
_A Munster Woman:_
I have only seen them myself like dark shadows, but there's many can
see them as they are. Surely they bring away the dead among them.
There was a woman in County Limerick that died after her baby being
born. And all the people were in the house when the funeral was to
be, crying for her. And the cars and the horses were out on the road.
And there was seen among them a carriage full of ladies, and with
them the woman was sitting that they were crying for, and the baby
with her, and it dressed.
And there was another woman I knew of died, and left a family, and
often after, the people saw her in their dreams, and always in rich
clothes, though all the clothes she had were given away after she
died, for the good of her soul, except maybe her shawl. And her
husband married a serving girl after that, and she was hard to the
children, and one night the woman came back to her, and had like
to throw her out of the window in her nightdress, till she gave a
promise to treat the children well, and she was afraid not to treat
them well after that.
There was a farmer died and he had done some man out of a saddle, and
he came back after to a friend, and gave him no rest till he gave a
new saddle to the man he had cheated.
_Mrs. Casey:_
There was a woman my brother told me about and she had a daughter
that was red-haired. And the girl got married when she was under
twenty, for the mother had no man to tend the land, so she thought
best to let her go. And after her baby being born, she never got
strong but stopped in the bed, and a great many doctors saw her but
did her no good.
And one day the mother was at Mass at the chapel and she got a start,
for she thought she saw her daughter come in to the chapel with the
same shawl and clothes on her that she had before she took to the bed,
but when they came out from the chapel, she wasn't there. So she went
to the house, and asked was she after going out, and what they told her
was as if she got a blow, for they said the girl hadn't ten minutes to
live, and she was dead before ten minutes were out. And she appears
now sometimes; they see her drawing water from the well at night and
bringing it into the house, but they find nothing there in the morning.
_A Connemara Man:_
There was a man had come back from Boston, and one day he was out in
the bay, going towards Aran with £3 worth of cable he was after getting
from McDonagh's store in Galway. And he was steering the boat, and
there were two turf-boats along with him, and all in a minute they saw
he was gone, swept off the boat with a wave and it a dead calm.
And they saw him come up once, straight up as if he was pushed, and
then he was brought down again and rose no more.
And it was some time after that a friend of his in Boston, and that
was coming home to this place, was in a crowd of people out there.
And he saw him coming to him and he said, "I heard that you were
drowned," and the man said, "I am not dead, but I was brought here,
and when you go home, bring these three guineas to McDonagh in Galway
for it's owed him for the cable I got from him." And he put the
three guineas in his hand and vanished away.
_An Old Army Man:_
I have seen hell myself. I had a sight of it one time in a vision. It
had a very high wall around it, all of metal, and an archway in the
wall, and a straight walk into it, just like what would be leading
into a gentleman's orchard, but the edges were not trimmed with box
but with red-hot metal. And inside the wall there were cross walks,
and I'm not sure what there was to the right, but to the left there
was five great furnaces and they full of souls kept there with great
chains. So I turned short and went away; and in turning I looked
again at the wall and I could see no end to it.
And another time I saw purgatory. It seemed to be in a level place
and no walls around it, but it all one bright blaze, and the souls
standing in it. And they suffer near as much as in hell, only there
are no devils with them there, and they have the hope of heaven.
And I heard a call to me from there "Help me to come out of this!"
And when I looked it was a man I used to know in the army, an
Irishman and from this country, and I believe him to be a descendant
of King O'Connor of Athenry. So I stretched out my hand first but
then I called out "I'd be burned in the flames before I could get
within three yards of you." So then he said, "Well, help me with your
prayers," and so I do.
VII
APPEARANCES
VII
APPEARANCES
_When I had begun my search for folk-lore, the first to tell me he
himself had seen the Sidhe was an old, perhaps half-crazed man I will
call Michael Barrett_ (_for I do not give the real names either of
those who are living or who have left living relatives_). _I had one
day asked an old woman who had been spinning wool for me, to be made
into frieze by our weavers, if she had ever seen the faery host. She
said, "I never saw them myself nor I don't think much of them; it is
God that takes us or leaves us as He will. But a neighbouring man was
standing in my door last night, and there's no day of the year he
doesn't hear them or feel them._
"_It's in his head I think it does be, and when he stood in the door
last night I said 'the wind does be always in my ears and the sound of
it never stops,' to make him think it was the same with him. But he
said, 'I hear them singing and making music all the time, and one of
them's after bringing out a little flute, and it's on it he's playing
to them.' Sure he has half his chimney pulled down, where they used to
be sitting and singing to him day and night. But those that are born
in the daytime never have power to see or hear them all their life._"
_Another neighbour talked to me of him and said, "One night he was
walking across the bog, and a lurcher, a bastard hound, with him. And
something ran across the path in the shape of a white cat, and the
lurcher went after him, and Barrett went home and to bed and left the
door open for the lurcher to come in. And in the morning they found it
there, lying under the table, and it paralysed and not able to stir.
But after a few months it got better, and one night they were crossing
the bog again and the same thing ran across their path, and this time
in the form of a deer. But the dog wouldn't follow it again, but shrank
behind Barrett until such time as it had passed by."_
_My spinning woman, coming another time with chickens to sell, said,
"Barrett is after telling me this morning that they were never so bad
as these last two nights. 'Friday fine-day' is what they say now, in
Irish, and he got no sleep till he threatened to throw dirty water
over them. The poor man, they do say they are mostly in his head now,
but sure he was a fine fresh man twenty years ago, the night he saw
them all linked in two lots, like slips of girls walking together.
And it was that very same day that Hession's little girl got a touch
from them. She was as fine a little girl as ever you saw, and her
mother sent her into Gort to do a message. And on the road she met a
red-haired woman, with long wisps of hair as bright as silver, and
she said, 'Where are you going and who are you?' 'I'm going to Gort
on a message,' says she, 'and I'm Mrs. Hession's daughter of such a
place.' Well, she came home, and that very night she got a pain in
her thigh, with respects to you, and she and her mother have half the
world walked since then, trying to get relief for her; but never a
bit better did she ever get. And no doubt at all but that's the very
same day Michael Barrett saw them in the field near Hession's house."_
_I asked Mr. Yeats to come with me to see the old man, and we walked
up the long narrow lane, from which we could see Slieve Echtge and
the Burren hills, to the little cabin with its broken chimney where
Michael Barrett told us of those that had disturbed his rest. This
was the first time we went together to enquire into the Hierarchy of
the Sidhe, of which by degrees we have gathered so much traditional
and original knowledge._
_As to old Barrett, I saw him from time to time, and he told me he was
still "tormented," and that "there is one that sat and sang b-b-b all
the night" til a few evenings before he had got a bit of rag and tied
it to a long stick, and hit at him when he came, and drove him out
with the rest. And in the next spring I heard he was ill, and that "on
Saturday he had been told by three he was to die." When I visited him I
found him better, and he said that since the warning on Saturday they
had left him alone "and the children that used to be playing about with
them have gone to some other place; found the house too cold for them
maybe." That was the last time I saw him; I am glad I had been able to
help him to more warmth and comfort before the end._
_I asked the old man's brother, a labourer, what he thought of
Michael's visions, but he made little of them. "Old he is, and it's
all in the brain the things he does be talking of. If it was a young
man told us of them we might believe him, but as to him, we pay no
attention to what he says at all. Those things are passed away, and
you--I beg your pardon for using that word--a person--hears no more
of them._
"_John Casey saw queer things? So he might. Them that travel by
night, why wouldn't they see queer things? But they'd see nothing if
they went to their bed quiet and regular._
"_Lydon that had the contract for the schoolhouse, we didn't mind much
what he said happened him the night he slept there alone, and in the
morning he couldn't stir across the floor from the place where he was.
But who knows? Maybe he had too much drink taken before he went to bed.
It was no wonder in the old times if there was signs and the like where
murder had been. But that's come to an end, and time for it._
"_There's another man, one Doran, has the same dreams and thoughts
as my brother, and he leaves pieces of silver on the wall; and when
they're took--it's the faeries! But myself I believe it's the boys do
be watching him._
"_No, these things are gone from the world, and there's not the same
dread of death there used to be. When we die we go to judgment, and
the places we'll get there, they won't be the same as what we had
here. The charitable, the kind-hearted, lady or gentleman, who'd
have a chance if they didn't? But the tyrants and schemers, what
chance will there be for the like of them?_"
"_You will have a good place there, Barrett, you and John Farrell.
You have done your work better than most of us through all your life,
and it's likely you'll be above us there._"
"_I did my work all my life, fair and honest every day; and now that
I'm old, I'll keep on the same track to the last. Like a horse that
might be racing at Galway racecourse or another, there might be eight
leaps or ten leaps he might be frightened at; but when he's once over
the last leap there's no fear of him. Why would he fail then, with
the winning post so near at hand?_"
_I was told by A Gatekeeper:_
There was once a family, the O'Hagans living in Dromore Hill, that now
belongs to you, well-to-do people. And one day the son that had been
at college was coming back, and there was a great dinner being made in
the house. And a girl was sent off to a spring by the forth to get some
water, and when she passed by the forth, she heard like the crying of
a child and some one said to it "Nothing given to us today, no milk
spilled for us, nothing laid out for us, but tonight we'll have what we
want and there will be waste and overflow." And that evening the young
man that was coming home got a fall from his horse, and was killed, and
all the grand things for the dinner were thrown about and went to loss.
So never begrudge the drop of milk you'll spill, or the bit you'll let
fall, it might turn all to good in the end.
* * * * *
One night at the house below it was just getting dark, and a man came
in the gate and to the door and came in and fell down on a chair.
And when I saw him shaking and his face so white, I thought it was
the _fear gortha_ (the hungry grass) he had walked on, and I called
to the wife to give him something to eat. But he would take nothing
but a cup of water with salt in it, and when he got better he told us
that when he was passing the big tree a man and a woman came out and
came along with him. They didn't speak but they walked on each side
of him, and then the woman seemed to go away, but the man's step was
with him till he came in at the gate.
* * * * *
There was a girl of the Heniffs brought the dinner one day to where
the men were working near where the river rises at Coole. And when she
had left the dinner she began to gather kippeens, and put them in her
shawl, and began to twist a rope of the ends of it to tie them up. And
at that moment she was taken up, and where she found herself was in
Galway, sitting in the Square. And she had no money, and she began to
think of the friends she had there and to say, "If they knew where I
was they'd give me money to bring me back." And in those days there was
a coach that ran from Galway to Kiltartan, and she found herself in it,
and it starting, and it left her safe and sound again at home.
_Mrs. Casey:_
There was a girl at Tyrone was bringing back some apples out of the
garden there. And on the road she met a man, and she thought that he
was one of the old St. Georges, and he asked where did she get the
apples, and bid her put them down in the road, and when she opened the
bundle they were all turned to eggs. So she put them up again and
brought them home, and when she and her mother looked at them in the
house they were beginning to crack, and the chickens to put their beaks
through them; so they put them in the corner of the kitchen for the
night, and in the morning when they went to look at them they were all
turned to apples again, but they thought best not to eat them.
_A Munster Woman:_
There was a woman I knew in County Limerick, near Foynes--Mrs.
Doolan, a nurse. She was called out of bed one night by a small man
with a lamp, and he led her to a place she had never seen before,
and into a house, and there was a woman in a bed and the child was
born after she came. And I always heard her say it was a faery she
attended. And the man led her back and gave her a sovereign, and bid
her change it before sunrise.
* * * * *
And I know a boy lived on Lord Dunraven's property, one of a family
of large farmers, and he had a settle-bed in the kitchen, and one
night he saw the kitchen full of them, and they making up the fire
and cooking, and they set out the table and ate at it.
* * * * *
I often heard they'd fight in November at the time of harvest, and
my father told me that in the year of the famine there was great
fighting heard up in the sky, and they were crying out, "Black
potatoes, black potatoes, we'll have them now." I suppose it was one
tribe of them fighting against another for them. And the oats in that
year were all black as well as the potatoes.
_A Clare Man:_
I saw them myself one night I was going to Ennis with a load of
straw. It was when we came to Bunnahow and the moon was shining, and
I was on the top of the load of straw, and I saw them in a field.
Just like jockeys they were, and riding horses, red clothes and caps
they had like a jockey would have, but they were small. They had a
screen of bushes put up in the field and some of the horses would
jump over it, and more of them would baulk when they'd be put to it.
The men that were with me didn't see them, they were walking in the
road, but they heard the sound of the horses.
_Another Clare Man:_
I heard a churning one time in the hill up by the road beyond. I was
coming back from Kinvara, and I heard it plain, no mistake about it.
I was sorry after I didn't call down and ask for a drink. Johnny Moon
did so, and got it. If you wish for a drink and they put it out for
you, it's no harm to take it, but if you refuse it, some harm might
happen to you. Johnny Henderson often told that he heard churning in
that spot, but I wouldn't believe the sun rising from him, he had so
many lies. But after that, I said, "Well, Johnny Henderson has told
the truth for once anyhow."
_A Miller:_
There was Tom Gantly one evening was going to Coole, and he heard a
step behind him and it followed him every bit of the way, till he got
to the hall door of Coole House; but he could see nothing.
He saw a gig one night on the road there by the wall and it full of
ladies laughing and grandly dressed--the best of hats and feathers
they had. And it turned and passed him a second time. And with the
fright he got, he never would pass that bit of road by himself again.
* * * * *
There were two men went one night to catch rabbits in that field
you have let now to Father Fahy, and the one next it. And when they
were standing there they heard a churning below. So they went on a
little way, and they heard a tambourine below, music going on and the
beating of a drum. So they moved a little farther on and then they
heard the sound of a fiddle from below. So they came home and caught
no rabbits that night.
_J. Creevy:_
May is a great time with these strangers, and November is a bad
month for them, and this month you're in now. I was trying the
other day in the town to get a marriage made up for a girl that was
seduced--and the family wouldn't have it this month because of that.
* * * * *
One night on the Kiltartan road I saw a flock of wool by the road
side, and I gave a kick at it and it didn't move, and then another
kick and it didn't move. So it can have been no natural thing.
* * * * *
And Lee told me that one night he saw red men riding through the
country and going over ditches.
* * * * *