THE FAIRIES--AND FAREWELL!
The Raths, or "fairy forts," of Killarney have hitherto seldom been
explored. They are circular grassy mounds enclosing a field, generally
small. Underneath are found stone chambers, their beehive roofs and
walls made of unmortared stone. It is supposed that here the ancient
Celts fortified themselves and their cattle, retreating in winter into
the stone chambers. Be this as it may, for centuries the Irish have
believed them to be tenanted by a fairy race, whose palaces are here,
and who guard hidden treasure.
These are the Sidhe, or people of the hill, the noblest among these
mysterious folk. Some say they are the spirits of the Tuatha de Danan,
that strange race which occupied Ireland till the Milesians came,
when, conquered by a greater magic than their own, they disappeared.
Strange to say, no mortal descendant of these people has ever been
traced in any Irish family.
[Illustration: CUTTING PEAT FROM THE BOG.
It takes less than a week for a man to cut his fuel supply for a
whole year.]
But there is another race, and these are the fairies proper, very
human in their traits, tricky and malicious if slighted or offended,
but good friends if treated properly. I cannot resist quoting a story
("Hanafin and his Cows") told in a late Kerry Archæological Magazine
by Lady Gordon--a tale of the fairies, originally collected in Kerry
by Mr. J. Curtin.
"Hanafin was a farmer owning a large herd of cows, which were driven
up every morning to be milked in front of his house. For several days
the tub into which the milk was poured was mysteriously overturned and
the milk spilled. Hanafin's wife was naturally excessively indignant,
but, in spite of every precaution, the milk continued to be upset. One
morning, however, as Hanafin was walking past a fairy fort, he heard a
child crying inside it, and a woman's voice saying: 'Be quiet awhile!
Hanafin's cows are going home; we'll soon have milk in plenty.'
Hanafin went home and personally supervised the milking, and on the
usual overturning stopped his wife from scolding, telling her this
time it was no fault of the girls, who had been pushed by one of the
cows against the tub. 'Leave it to me,' he said; 'I'll try and manage
the business.'
"The following morning, on hearing the child cry again in the fort,
Hanafin, 'like the brave man he was,' went inside. He saw no one, but
he said, 'A child is crying for milk. A cow of mine will calve
to-morrow. I'll let no one milk that cow; you can do what you like
with her milk.'
"The tub was never overturned again, and for two years Hanafin
prospered in every way, taking good care of the cow, and never letting
her be milked.
"Unfortunately, however, Hanafin, being soft-hearted, went security
for some of his neighbours who had got into trouble, with the result
that their creditors came down on him, and the bailiffs arrived one
day to drive off his cattle. Hanafin repaired to the fort, and said:
'I'm going to lose all my cattle, but I'll try and keep the cow I gave
you, and feed her still, so that the child may have the milk.'
"Three bailiffs came and went down to the pasture across the field,
but when they drove the cows up as far as the fairy fort 'each
bailiff was caught and thrown hither and over by people he couldn't
see. One moment he was at one side of the ditch, the next at the
other. They were so roughly handled and bruised that they were hardly
alive, and they not seeing who or what was doing it! The cattle,
raising their tails, bawled and ran off to the pasture.'
"The following morning ten policemen and bailiffs went to take
Hanafin's cattle, with exactly the same results, so that the men
'barely left the place alive.' Never again did police or bailiff
meddle with Hanafin's cattle, and the creditors never collected their
money."
These are the familiar fairies who stole children out of their
cradles, young matrons from their husbands, and girls from their
lovers; who bewitched cows and blighted potatoes, but who "did you
many a good turn too." The peasant will not lightly lose faith in
them, nor will the fairies lightly forsake the land of beauty, of
sunshine, and of shadow. Quickly as events march and ideas change in
this wonderful age, hurrying we know not where, and though here and
there someone may be found to dare--or say he will--enter a fairy fort
or cut down a fairy thorn, I think that with the boldest of these
unbelievers it is a case of the man who denied the power of the priest
to turn him into a rat, but who, saying "It's as well to make sure,"
took the precaution of shutting up the cat at night. "Taking it all
round," writes Lady Gordon, "it would be a drab world if there were no
fairies in it, no supernatural region in which nothing is too
preposterous to occur.... Earth-bound humanity, seeking to escape from
earth cares, still dreams in one form or other of a land of strange
happenings."
How much remains still to be said about Killarney, its varied
interests, its shifting, matchless scenery! The lover of beauty and
romance, the historian, the archæologist, the antiquary--it is a field
for each. It has begun to dawn on the mind of many explorers what
great questions hinge on Celtic antiquities, what light they may shed
upon the ancient history of Europe, while students of the Irish
language say it will yet prove the key to ancient ones which are
puzzling philologists. Killarney is rich in Ogham inscriptions, in
curious old remains and relics (utilized hitherto by mason and
builder). Such as are not hopelessly lost are gradually being
unearthed by the ardent seekers of to-day.
Whatever changes may be in the future, Killarney must ever remain a
land of enchantment. Perhaps a few recent words of Alfred Austin may
fitly close this attempt to sketch the principal features of this fair
land.
"The tender grace of wood and water is set in a framework of hills,
now stern, now ineffably gentle, now dimpling with smiles, now
frowning and rugged with impending storm, now muffled and mysterious
with mist, only to meet you again with brilliant sunshine. Here the
trout leaps, there the eagle soars, and there beyond the wild deer
dash through the arbutus covert, through which they have come to the
margin of the lake to drink, and, scared by your footstep or your oar,
are away back to bracken or heather-covered moorland. But the first,
the final, the deepest and most enduring impression of Killarney is
that of beauty unspeakably tender, which puts on at times a garb of
grandeur and a look of awe, only to heighten by contrast its soft
loveliness. How the missel thrushes sing, as well they may! How the
streams and runnels leap and laugh! For the sound of journeying water
is never out of your ears, the feeling of the moist, the fresh, the
vernal is never out of your heart."
No, never! True words are these with which reluctantly to say farewell
to beautiful Killarney.
INDEX
Aghadoe, 12
Antiquities of Kerry, 53
Arbutus, The, 26
Austin, Alfred, 61
Black Valley, 20
Chess in Ancient Ireland, 19
Clancarty, Earl of, 36
Classical learning amongst older generation, 51
Coleman's Eye, 28
Devil's Punch Bowl, 36
Devil's Stream, 37
Dunloe Castle, 14
Dunloe, Gap of, 17
Eagle Island, 27
Fairies, The, 56
Foliage of mountain-sides, 24
"Geraldines, The," 54
Glena, 46
Golf Links, 12
Guides, The, 39
"Hanafin and His Cows," 57
Innisfallen, Abbey of, 44
Innisfallen, Annals of, 44
Innisfallen Island, 43
Islands, The, 23
Kate Kearney's cottage, 16
Killarney folk, 49
Lakes and mountains, 23
Last Irish snake, 20
"Light of Love," 29
Logan Stone, 21
Long Range, The, 28
"Lord Brandon's Cottage," 22
Lough Leane, 47
Ludlow, Parliamentary General, 39
Macaulay, Lord, his words on Innisfallen, 43
MacCarthy's Island, 27
MacGillicuddy's Reeks, 18
Mineral treasures, 37, 41
Moore, Thomas, the poet, 16
Muckross Abbey, 33
Muskerry, Lord, the Royalist, 39
O'Donoghue and his white charger, 6, 40
O'Donoghues of Ross, The, 40
Ogham inscriptions, 15, 53
Origin of the lakes, legendary, 9
_Osmundi Regalia_, 28
O'Sullivan's Cascade, 47
Precious Stones of Kerry, 42, 43
Ptolemy's map of Ireland, 51
Purple Mountain, 18
Raths, or fairy forts, 56
Ross Castle, 38
Scota, Queen, daughter of Pharaoh, 53
Settlements of Ireland, early, 52
Sidhe, the, or People of the Hill, 56
Stag-hunting, 48
Stillman, the famous war correspondent, 7
Toomies Mountain, 18, 46
Torc Cascade, 36
_Trichomanes speciosum_, or Brutle Fern, 29
Voice of Nature, The, 7
BILLING AND SONS, LTD., PRINTERS, GUILDFORD
Transcriber's Note
Minor punctuation errors have been fixed.
The following amendments have been made, for consistency:
Page 24--McGillicuddy's amended to MacGillicuddy's--... even
in point of height the MacGillicuddy's Reeks ...
Page 50--McCarthy amended to MacCarthy--"I am a MacCarthy; my
husband is only a so-and-so," ...
The frontispiece illustration has been moved to follow the title page.
Other illustrations have been moved where necessary so that they are
not in the middle of a paragraph.
The List of Illustrations notes that "The Eagle's Nest, Killarney"
appears "On the cover." This is preserved as printed; however the
illustration was actually located facing page 22, and the transcriber
has left it in this location.
Ditto marks in the Index have been replaced with the appropriate words.