There was once a man of these parts and he had a great longing for
to find a treasure.
It chanced one evening that he seen a gankeynogue in the field,
sitting in under a bush, and he says:
"Yon lad will surely be worth a powerful weight of gold."
With that he went over and caught a hold of the gankey.
"Let you discover a treasure," says he, "or else I'll keep you like
a dog on a chain from this out."
"Keep away!" says the gankey. "How would a poor creature like myself
be finding treasure for a strong farmer!"
"Let you not let on to be miserable," says the man, "for well I know
it's great wealth you enjoy."
"Is it me!" says the gankeynogue. "Sure I support a lengthy family
entirely by my own industry."
But the farmer would not believe a word of the sort. He carried the
gankey to his house and put him into a big oak chest.
"You'll never get out except for to show me where treasure is lodged,"
he allows.
But the gankeynogue wasn't in notion of giving the least
information. He sat up in the oak chest, hammering, shouting and
singing until he had the people's heads light.
All the while the farmer was determined to get the better of him and
he never agreed to let him go.
The lad was his tenth day in the chest when the man of the house came
running in that evening, shouting at the top of his voice:
"Darragh fort's on fire! Darragh fort's on fire!"
With that the gankey began the most woeful lamentations, and he
hammering like mad to get out of the chest.
"What ails you at all?" asks the farmer.
"My wife and family are in that place," says the gankey. "Let me away
to bring them safe from the fire."
"Will you show me a treasure?" asks the man. "Aye surely!" says the
gankeynogue. "But let's go first to Darragh fort to save my weak
family, and then I'll bestow the treasure."
So the two started off for Darragh fort, and it not on fire at
all--that was a story the man was after inventing for to scare the
gankeynogue.
When they landed in sight of the place the man allowed the fire be
to have burnt out. Didn't the gankey make a run and lep in among
the trees.
"I'm safe from you now," says he.
But the man never let on to be vexed that he couldn't see the lad any
more, he listened to his voice speaking for to know the direction
he went. Then he lay down in that part of the fort and let on to
be asleep.
After a while he heard the gankeynogue telling his wife about how he
was kept in the chest.
"I was ten days in that place," says he. "And I full of venom against
the farmer. But it's the cunning lad I am, for I never let on where
the treasure is buried at all."
"Where is it?" asks the gankeynogue's wife.
"Under a stone in the street before his house," says the gankey. "And
herself tripped and spilled a bucket of milk just over the place this
morning. I was looking out on a hole in the chest, and still I never
let on one word when I seen what happened."
"You're a wise little fellow, sure enough," says his wife.
The farmer got up and away home with him after hearing what they
said. He asked herself where she spilled the milk at the morning of
the day.
"By that stone," says she, setting her foot on a flag in the street.
He brought the loy and a crowbar for to hoke up the place, and didn't
he discover a beautiful treasure of gold.