“and leave her lying there.” The king left her lying. The red man gave
one flail to the king, and one to his master.
“Strike you the first blow.”
The king struck the first blow. The three were striking her for a long
time. A blaze of fire came out of her mouth. “Strike ye more. There is
more in her.”
They struck till another lump of fire came out of her mouth. “Strike,”
said the red man, “there is one more in her.”
They struck till the third came. “Now,” said the red man, “strike her no
more. Those were three devils that came out of her. Loose her now; she is
as quiet as any woman in the world.”
They loosed her and put her to bed. She was tired after the beating.
The priest of the pattens and the clerk of the bells came. The pair were
married. The red man stayed with them a year and a day. A young son was
born to them. When the day and the year were up the red man said it was
time for him to be going.
“I don’t know what I’ll do after you,” said the kings son.
“Oh, make no delay,” said the red man; “the hire is just.”
“It is just,” said the king’s son.
He made two halves of all he gained since he hired him. “I will give you
my child all,” said he; “I think it a pity to go to cut him in two.”
“I will not take him all,” said the red man; “I will not take but my
bargain.”
The king’s son took a knife and was going to cut. “Stop your hand,” said
the red man. “Do you remember the day you were going past the churchyard?
There were four men in the churchyard. They had a corpse, and they were
arguing about the debts that were on the corpse. They were not willing to
bury the corpse till the debts were paid. You had five pounds. You gave
them to bury the corpse. It was I was in the coffin that day. When I saw
you starting on your journey I went to you to save you, you were that
good yourself. I bestow on you your child and your money. Health be with
you and blessing. You will set eyes upon me no more.”
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
_GRIG._
_Narrator, JACK GILLESPIE, Glen, Glencolumkille, co. Donegal._
Morrocha heard that Grig would live for ever, until he was killed without
sin. He left home to put Grig to death; and he and his boy went one day
on the hill, and there came on them rain and mist, and they went astray
till night came; and the boy said to Morrocha, “We shall be out this
night.”
“Oh, we shall not be,” said Morrocha. And he went and looked through
the mist. “I think I see a turf stack: it is not possible we are near a
house?” They went on for another bit, and Morrocha stood: “I think,” said
he, “I hear the lowing of a cow.”
“We are near a house,” said the boy, “and we’ll get into the byre.”
Morrocha stood up, and he felt the breath of a man, and he came to him.
“Bless you,” said Morrocha.
“My blessing to you,” said the man; “for if you did not bless me, I would
have your head or you would have mine.”
“The death-bands on you,” said Morrocha; “sorry I am I came to ask
shelter of you.”
Said Theegerje, “I have no shelter to give you. There is not a house
nearer to you than the house of Grig, and that is seven miles away; and
if you go there don’t tell that you have seen me. I am his servant boy,
and Grig is lying on the one bed for seven years, and if you go there
tell him you are the best doctor ever stepped.”
Morrocha went on then, and when he came to Grig’s house, said Grig, “If
it were not that you are a good doctor, I would cut the head from you.”
“The death-bands on you,” said Morrocha; “sorry I am I came to cure you,
above and beyond the report I heard about you at home and abroad.”
“And,” said Grig, “if I had Njuclas Croanj and my wife she would not be
on your side.”
She was sleeping at Grig’s back in the bed, and he told her to get up,
and she did not stir, and Grig lifted his hand and struck her on the
jaw-bone and put it out of joint, and she awoke and she said, “What made
you do that to me?”
“Be silent, woman; don’t you see the Irish doctor that’s come to cure me,
and to see me hale and whole and as good as ever I was?”
“Musha, it’s a poor place he’s come to. There isn’t a wisp dry or wet
that isn’t under your side, and we haven’t a stool better than the floor,
or a chair better than a lump of clay, and we haven’t as much fire as
would cook the wing of a butterfly.”
“Be silent, woman,” said Grig, “and take my old great coat and fix it
under me.”
She did that; and Theegerje came, and a load of faggots with him, and he
put down a good fire, and Morrocha got food to eat, and when he warmed
himself at the fire he was weary-wet, and he was falling asleep.
“The death-bands on you,” said Grig; “you’re not like a doctor, for
you’ve never asked what kind of sickness is on me.”
“It is not that,” said Morrocha; “but there are numbers of people, and
their blood runs all together when they see strangers.”
“I am of them,” said Grig.
“I was not going to feel your pulse until you got quiet.”
When he became quiet Morrocha arose and felt his pulse.
“And great is the pity,” said he, “that a fine man like you should be
lying in that place on one bed, and I will cure you. If you got potatoes
and butter, and ate the full of your fist, you would not be long sick.”
“That’s true,” said Grig, “and if Njuclas Croanj gave me that I wouldn’t
be lying here.”
Morrocha asked if they had any food in the house, and Njuclas Croanj said
they had,—that Theegerje was just after coming from the mill, and that
he had three pecks of oatmeal. And Morrocha bade them give him a peck of
meal, and she gave him that. And he asked if there was any butter in the
house, and she said there was. “Bring me down a crock of fresh butter,”
said he. And she brought that to him, and Morrocha mixed the meal and the
butter up together, and he asked for a spoon, and he thrust the spoon
into the dish.
“Do you see that?” said he.
“I see,” said Grig.
“You won’t get it,” said Morrocha, “till you tell me what was the horde
of people from whom you came.”
“I will tell you that,” said Grig. “I am Grig, son of Stubborn, son of
Very-evil, Shanrach, son of Canrain, son of the Soldier, who made people
loathe him greatly.”
“The death-bands on you,” said Morrocha. “Weren’t they ugly names they
had?”
“The death-bands on you,” said Grig. “Isn’t it you that are ugly? They
were prosperous, blessed.”
“I give in that they were,” said Morrocha. “It was ignorance made me say
that. But what sort was that one, the son of the Soldier?”
“This,” said Grig, “was one of the fathers who came before me; and the
snout of a pig was on his forehead; and he had two daughters, whose names
were Maywa, the big, Molloy’s daughter, and the other’s Sahwa, the big,
daughter of Cricheen, and they went to Cornelius (?) the tailor, and they
gathered the clippings the tailors threw away, and they made up two lying
books of them, and they failed to make the books agree upon one story;
and they struck one another, and the father came, and they struck their
father and cut him; and he went, and he in his blood, and the pig’s snout
on his forehead, and there is not one that saw him, but they would flee
from him in thousands. And at last they got the two books to agree upon
one story, and when the clergy heard they had the books, they desired to
possess them, and they would not give them. And they banished them; and
if they banished them we will not leave the night supperless.”
“And now,” said Morrocha, “I will give you supper.” And he went and
gave the dish to Grig, and he ate the peck of meal and the butter mixed
together. “Now,” said the other, “thirst will come on you; the butter was
saltish, but do not drink a drop until I gather herbs that will help your
sickness.” He went and the boy, and Njuclas Croanj and Theegerje with
them, and they put down a big pot full of water before they went, and
Morrocha gathered the full of a basket of hellebore (?) and he gathered
tormentil, and he went into the house with Njuclas Croanj and Theegerje,
and he bade them put the herbs into the pot and boil them, and when he
grew thirsty to give him some of the liquor to drink, and, if he wished,
some of the stalks to eat, “and I will gather more, and will come in to
see if he is getting better.”
And Grig took a great thirst, and he set to drinking what was in the pot,
and he drank it all; and when Njuclas Croanj went in, Morrocha and his
boy went away; and when Grig drank the last of what was in the pot, he
burst as he lay on the bed; and when Njuclas Croanj saw he was dead, she
followed Morrocha; but since the Lord was with Morrocha, he escaped.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
_THE LITTLE GIRL WHO GOT THE BETTER OF THE GENTLEMAN._
_Narrator, P. M’GRALE, Achill, co. Mayo._
There was an old man with a little girl of seven years, and he was
begging; and he came to a gentleman, and begged of him; and the gentleman
said it would be better for him to go and earn wages than to be as he
was—begging; and the man said he would go, and willingly, if he got any
one to pay him, and the other said he would himself give him pay, and a
house to live in for himself, and for the little girl to come to and wash
and cook for him. He gave them the house, and they went to live in it.
They were not long there when the gentleman came to the little girl one
day, and thought to take liberties with her, but she kept herself free
from him. When he saw that, he went to his workmen, and he spoke to her
father, and said to him that he would hang him at twelve o’clock next
day unless he told him which there was the greater number of, rivers
or banks. His intention was to put the old man to death, that he might
have his way with the little girl. And the old man went home sorrowful
and troubled, and his daughter asked him what ailed him, and he told her
he was to be hung at twelve o’clock next day unless he could tell which
there was the greater number of, rivers or banks.
“Oh, don’t be sorrowful,” said his daughter, “eat your supper, and sleep
plenty, and eat your breakfast in the morning, and when you are going to
work, I will tell you.”
In the morning said she to him, “Say, when he asks you the question, that
there is not a river but has two banks.”
When he went to work the master came and asked him, “Which is there the
greater number of, rivers or banks?”
“There is not a river,” said he, “but has two banks.”
“Your question is answered; but you must tell me to-morrow the number of
the stars.”
And he went home in the evening sorrowful and troubled. And his daughter
asked him what ailed him, and he told her. She bade him not to be
sorrowful, for she would tell him in the morning. And in the morning he
went to his work, and his master came and asked him to count the number
of the stars; and he said,—
“I will, if you put posts under them.”
And he could not do that, but he said,—
“I will hang you at twelve to-morrow, if you don’t give me the measure of
the sea in quarts.”
And he went home to his daughter and told her, and in the morning, as he
was going to work, she said,—
“Let him stop the rivers that are going into the sea or out of it, and
you will measure it in quarts.”
So he gave that answer to his master, and his master could not stop the
rivers.
Then he asked for the little girl in marriage, and the old man told him
not to be making fun of the little girl, she was not fit for him. He
would get a lady.
“I will not do that,” said he, “you must give her to me to marry.”
“Well, I must see the little girl; she will know what she will do.”
He went to his daughter and told her what the gentleman said, and the
little girl answered her father, and said to him,—
“I will marry him, but he must give me a writing under his hand that on
the day when he puts me away he must give me my choice of all that’s in
his house, to take away three loads with me.”
And he said he would give her that, and she got it in his handwriting and
signed by the lawyer.
Then the little girl came and lived in his house with him until she had
two children.
At that time there was a dispute in the village between two men, one of
whom had a horse, and the other a mare and a foal, and the three beasts
used to be together. And the man who owned the horse said that the foal
belonged to the horse; and the man of the mare, said no, that the foal
was his; and the man who owned the horse put law on the man who owned the
mare, and they left it to arbitration; and the man who was brought in
to decide was the gentleman, who said he would settle it between them.
And this is the judgment he gave, “He would put the three beasts into an
empty house, and he would open two doors, and which ever of the two the
foal followed, she should be with that one.” And he (did so) and opened
the doors, and struck each beast, and prodded the horse; and the horse
went out first and the foal followed him. Then the foal was given to the
man who owned the horse.
All was well till there came some gentlemen to the house. They went out
hunting. And when they were a while gone the woman took a fishing-rod,
and she went fishing in the lake, and she was catching white trout until
she saw the company coming, and she turned her back to the lake, and she
began casting her line on the dry land. When her husband saw that, he
went towards her, away from the other people, and he came and said it
was a great wonder she should be casting her line on the dry ground and
the lake on the other side of her; and she said it was a great wonder
that a horse without milk should have a foal. That made him very angry,
and he said on the spot,—
“After your dinner get ready and go from me.”
“Will you give me what you promised?”
“I will give it.”
After dinner, when the gentlemen were gone, he told her to be going, and
she stood up and took with her her own child as a load and laid it down
outside the door. She came in and took the second child as her load and
put it outside. She came and she said, “I believe yourself are the load
that’s nearest to me.” And she threw her arms round him and took him out
as her third load. “You are now my own,” said she, “and you cannot part
from me.”
“Oh! I am content,” said he, “and I promise I will not part from you for
ever.”
They lived together then, and she took her father into the house, and he
was with her until he died. They had a long life after.
[Illustration]
_GILLA OF THE ENCHANTMENTS._
_Narrator, P. M’GRALE, Dugort, Achill co. Mayo._
There was a king in Ireland and his wife, and they had but one daughter,
whose name was Gilla of the Enchantments, and she had a magic coat that
her mother left her when she died. And there was a man courting her whose
name was George nă Riell, and the two were courting.
When her mother died the king made a fair and beautiful greenawn for his
three sons on an island in the midst of the sea, and there he put them to
live; and he sent his daughter to them with food every evening.
It was not long after that till he married another wife, and by this wife
he had three daughters. She was one day walking in the garden, and she
got the corner of her apron under her foot and she fell.
“May neither God nor Mary be with you,” said the hen-wife.
“Why do you say that?” said the queen.
“Because the wife that was here before was better than you.”
“Was there a wife before me?”
“There was; and that one is her daughter, and there are three sons also
in an island in the sea, and the daughter goes every night to them with
food.”
“What shall I do with the three of them, to put them to death?”
“I’ll tell you,” said the hen-wife, “if you will do what I advise you.”
“I will do it,” said she.
“Promise a dowry to your eldest daughter if she will follow the (other)
daughter out when she is going with food to her brothers.”
And she sent her daughter after the one who was going with food; but she
looked behind her and saw the other coming, and she made a bog and a
lake between them, so big that she went astray. She came to her mother,
and told her she was wandering all the night, and the mother went to the
hen-wife again and told her that her daughter had not made her way to
the men; and the hen-wife said to her, “Promise a dowry to your second
daughter.”
And she did this, and the second daughter followed as the first did, and
fared in the same way, and she came and told her mother. And the mother
went again to the hen-wife, and told her, and asked what she ought to do,
and the hen-wife said, “Promise the dowry to your third daughter.”
And the third daughter followed Gilla of the Enchantments when she was
going with the food; and she did not look behind her till she came to
the house; and she put a pot of water down, and cut off the heads of her
three brothers, and washed them, and put them on their shoulders again.
And the half-sister was at the window looking on at everything she did,
and she went home through the sea, before the sea returned together; and
when they ate their supper, her sister came home.
The mother went in the morning to the hen-wife and told her the third
woman had succeeded, and had learned everything. And she asked her what
she should do.
“Say, now, that your daughter is going to be married, and ask Gilla for
the loan of the coat. She will not know that the power of the coat will
be gone if she gives it away. So long as she keeps the coat herself she
can do everything; there are spells on the coat that the sea must open
before it, without closing after it; but she does not know that the spell
of the coat will be lost.”
She gave the loan of the coat to her half-sister, but instead of going to
be married this is what she did. When night came she put the coat on and
went to the house of her half-brothers, knocked at the door, and asked
them to open it. And one of the brothers said, “That is not my sister.”
But another looked out of the window and saw the coat and recognised
it, and he opened the door and let her in. She cut the three heads off,
and took them three quarters of a mile and put them into a hole in the
ground, and went back to her mother and told her she had killed the
three. She gave the coat back to Gilla of the Enchantments, and Gilla
went in the evening to her brothers with food, and whatever sort of
fastening the other one put on the door she could not open it, but had to
go in by the window, and she found her three brothers dead.
She wept and she screamed and pulled the hair from her head in her
lamentations, till the whiteness of the day came upon the morrow. She
had not one head of the heads to get; but she followed the trace of the
blood, and three quarters of a mile from the house were they in the
place where they were buried. She dug them up, and took them to her, and
washed and cleaned them, as was her wont, and put them on the bodies,
but down they fell. She had to take them up at last, and cry to God to
do something to them, that she might see them alive. And there were made
of them three water-dogs (? otters) and she made another of herself.
They were going in that way for a time, and then they made themselves
into three doves, and she made of herself another dove. They were going
forward and she was following, and the four came and settled on the gable
of the house, and in the morning the man said to his wife,—
“There is a barrel of water. Let it be wine with you in the evening.”
(He had a thought that it was not the right woman he had got.)
Then said one of the brothers to the sister,—
“Go in, and do good in return for evil, and make wine of the water.”
She went down, and when she got in, and she in the shape of a dove, the
old blind wise man, who was lying on the bed under the window, got his
sight, and he saw her dipping her finger in the water and making of it
wine cold and wholesome.
And in the morning the man said to his wife,—
“Here is a barrel of water. Let it be wine with you in the evening.”
And the second brother said to his sister,—
“Go in, and do good in return for evil, and make wine of the water.”
She went down, and when she went in at the window, and she in the shape
of a dove, the old wise blind man, who was lying on the bed under the
window, got his sight, and saw her dipping her finger in the water and
making it wine cold and wholesome.
And in the morning on the third day the wise old man spoke to the king,
and said to him that he had seen a beautiful woman come in by the window
on two days, and that he got his sight when she came in and lost it when
she went out; and (said he) “Stretch yourself here to-day, and when she
comes in and makes wine of the water, catch her as she is going out.”
And he did so, and the third brother said to his sister,—
“Go down to-day, and do good in return for evil, and make the wine.”
And she did this; and as she was going out the man caught her. And when
her brothers heard that she was caught they went away. And she asked him
to give her leave to take just one look at her brothers.
“Here’s the corner of my apron.”
And he took hold of the corner of her apron, and she left him the apron
and went away after her brothers. When they saw her coming again they
waited for her, and she asked them if there was anything at all in the
world that would make them alive again; and they said there was one thing
only and that hard it was to do.
“What is it?” said she, “and I will try it.”
“To make three shirts of the ivy-leaves in a day and a year, without
uttering a word of speech or shedding a single tear, for if you weep[13]
we shall lose one member of our members.”
And she said to them to make a little hut for her in the wood, and they
made the hut and went away and left her there. She was not long till she
began to get material for the shirts, and she began to make them; and she
was not long in the house when George nă Riell came to her, and he was
with her till she had a child to him.
A young man was in the wood one day and a dog with him, and the dog took
him to the place where the woman was; and the man saw the woman and
the child there, and he went home and told the queen that there was a
beautiful woman in the wood. And she went and took the dog with her, as
if the dog was with George nă Riell. She went in and found the woman and
the babe, and she killed the babe and caught some of the blood, and mixed
the blood and ashes up together and made a cake, and she sought to put a
piece of the bread into the woman’s mouth. And the woman dropped one tear
from her eye; but the other went away home to her wedded husband, and she
said to him that great was the shame for him to have children by that
woman, and that she had had to kill her own child and eat it.
“It is not possible,” said he, “that she has killed my babe.”
“She killed and she ate.”
He went to her and found the child dead; but she did not speak a word to
him. He said then he would burn her at twelve o’clock on the next day,
and that he would put a tree of one foot and hang her on it. He commanded
that every one should come in the morning with sods of turf and sheets of
paper and everything to make a fire. And he put the tree standing, and
she was brought and put up on the top of the tree; and she was sewing
during this time. When it was twelve o’clock, sign was given she should
be hung, and an old man in the crowd asked them to give her another hour
by the clock; and when the hour was passed he asked again that they
should give her a half-hour; the woman in it (he said) was under gassa.
“You see that it is not her life that is troubling her, but that she is
always sewing.”
It was not long till they saw a black cloud coming through the air, and
they saw three things in the cloud coming.
“Well,” said the old man, “there are three angels from heaven, or three
devils from hell, coming for her soul.”
There were three black ravens coming, and their mouths open, and as it
were fire out of their mouths, till the three black ravens came and lay
in their sister’s bosom, and she on the top of the tree, and she put the
three shirts on them, and said,—
“Finn, Inn, and Brown Glegil, show that I am your sister, for in pain am
I to-day.”
They took hold of her and lifted her down from the tree, and the brothers
told George nă Riell everything that the half-sister had done, first that
she killed the three of them, and afterwards that it was she that killed
their sister’s child.
Then she was put up on the tree, and she was hung, and then thrown into
the fire. And they went home, and George nă Riell married Gilla of the
Enchantments and took her into his own house, and they spent the rest of
their life as is right.
I don’t know what happened to them since then.
[13] The narrator knew his story imperfectly as regards this point,
for she did shed one tear; but whether the brothers lost an eye in
consequence he was not sure.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
_THE WOMAN WHO WENT TO HELL._
_Narrator, P. MINAHAN, Malinmore, Glencolumkille, co. Donegal._