Irish Folk Tales (44 page)

“Would you like to join in?” asked one of them, as nice as you please.

“I would, indeed,” said Tom, “but is there a place for me?”

“There is surely,” said they, “for there’s a gap in one side.”

“Have you a hurley?” asked Tom.

“Here’s the best,” said they, handing one to him. A lovely stick it was.

So Tom played, and he played as never before, and his side won the match.

“I’ll tell you who we are now,” said the Good People, for they were very friendly with Tom. “We are from the churchyard beyond. But,” they added, “we are in a great fix, for we have to play our old rivals from Knockma on this night week, and they’ve got a mortal, the red-headed Paddy, Paddy Ruadh, to play for them, and he is the best hurler in Mayo. Could you help us?” said they.

“I could,” said Tom, “but could I have the same hurley?”

“You can,” said they.

So a week from that night Tom crept out, telling no one where he was going, and he reached the same field, and there were the two teams, and his hurley was waiting for him. And they played and they played, and in the finish Tom’s team won, and there was great joy in his team.

“What would you like now, and we’ll give it to you?” they said. “Anything you’d like at all?”

“I’d like that hurley,” said Tom. “ ’Tis the finest hurley I ever played with,” he said, “for I never missed a ball, high or low, with it.”

“That’s true enough,” they said. “You never missed a ball, high or low, but you’ve asked the one thing we can’t do. ’Tis fairy property and we couldn’t give it away.”

Tom was kind of hurt at this and he was an obstinate sort of a fellow.

“I must have it,” he says.

“You can’t,” they said.

“I must,” said Tom.

With that there was a great altercation, and, in the end, Tom walked off, taking the hurley with him.

Well, Tom was hardly home before he began to sicken. His mother could do nothing for him, and the doctor could do nothing for him.

“Is there anything at all that you’d wish?” said his mother to him one day.

“There’s a hurley up in the rafters,” said he. “Will you bring it down and put it on the end of the bed so I can see it?” he said.

And all the time he grew worse and worse. And when they seen that he was going to die, “Have you any last wish at all?” they said.

“Promise me one thing,” he said.

“We will,” they said.

“Promise me,” he said, “to put that hurley in the coffin alongside of me.”

Sure enough they did it. So maybe he’s still winning matches for Doonlaun.

T
HE BLACKSMITH OF BEDLAM AND THE FAIRY HOST

Long ago there was a blacksmith living here at Bedlam, where O’Donnell’s forge is now, who was known by the nickname of Yellow Billy. He and his wife had a small house west of the bridge on the right-hand side of the road, and there was no one else in their household.

It used to be said that there was no night of the year that the wee folk did not come in to yarn and chat with Billy. They had become so familiar with him that they used to throw things into the room to him. His wife noticed nothing odd as she could see nothing, but there was none of their tricks that Billy could not see.

At that time there was no road in the district except for a narrow path which went up to the head of the glen, and when people were bringing up sea-wrack this was a very difficult way. There was a sharp rock thrust out into the path which used to catch the panniers and people had to drive very carefully to get past it and often their loads were overturned. Many times they implored Billy to break this rock, since he had the only sledge hammer in the district, but Billy would not as much as lay a finger on it. He always used to say the rock was gentle and it might be better to leave it than to interfere with it.

Well and good. One night they made Billy drunk and then they dared him to break the rock. They enraged him so that he took his sledge hammer with him and made splinters of the rock.

The next night he did not get a wink of sleep. The wee folk came and filled his house with filth and dung. On the third night Billy went to the priest and told him how things were.

“Well,” said the priest, “I will be going to Gweedore on Sunday to say Mass and on my way home I will banish them, and if it is your wish I will put them in a place where they will never be able to harm a living person any more, but you must be of one mind with me.”

Billy went home and he was a very short time indoors before a little old man came in to speak with him.

“Billy,” he said, “you are bringing adversity on us after all we have done for you.”

“Well, you yourselves are to blame,” said Billy. “If you had behaved yourselves it would be long before I would interfere with you, but since I could get no peace, I had to do something.”

“Well, it is not right to bring adversity on us all because of a couple of rogues amongst us. It was a couple of our young lads who caused you all the trouble, and if you let us off this time maybe you will be the better for it and not one bit the worse.”

“I have nothing against you,” said Billy, “and if you let me off I won’t go further in the matter.”

“Well,” said the little old man, “there is a chest of gold buried out on the Yellow Sandbank and there is a man down there at Bun an Inbheara who has a boat. He will take you out and when he is over the sandbank, all he has to do is to put the gaff over the side of the boat, and as soon as it reaches the bottom it will hook the chest of gold.”

“I am afraid,” said Billy, “that when you had me out there you would drown me.”

“Don’t be the least afraid,” said the old man. “Take a bottle of holy water with you in the boat and nothing will come near you.”

“I won’t go,” said Billy.

“Well,” said the little old man, “there is a man up here at Caiseal whose foot is festering, and an herb growing in his own garden would cure it. If you go up, one of us will go with you and show you the herb, and all you will have to do is to rub the wound with it. That will cure him and from that on there is nothing you ask that he won’t do for you.”

“I won’t go there on any acount,” said Billy. “The way there is very lonely.”

“Well, Billy,” said the old man, “I can do no more for you. I know of nothing else about here that would help you unless it is some gold, a little or a lot, over there on the far side of the river and if you like, go over and take it. It is not worth much, but all the same, if you want it, take it.”

That same night Billy took a pickaxe across and began to dig at the place where the old man told him the gold was. He went on digging, but if he had been digging ever since, he could not have found the gold. When he had been digging for some time a little man came to the bank of the river opposite him and shouted to him to dig on the other side of the high ground in such and such a place and there he would find the gold. He did so, and soon he came on gold coins as large as five-shilling pieces. He took
them home. A little while later he sold them to a pedlar who came the way for sixpence apiece.

Well and good. Sunday came and when Billy thought it was time for the priest to be returning from Gweedore, he was waiting for him and when he came he spoke to him.

“Priest,” said he, “I think I will not interfere at all with the wee gentry.”

“Perhaps,” said the priest, “it is better so. See what they have done to me. They threw a fiery dart at me when I was coming through Gleann Thualla!”

So they were left undisturbed and from that day to the day he died they gave no trouble to Billy nor to anyone belonging to him.

F
AIRY FORTHS

It was a fairy tale told that if you could get ahold of a fairy, that he would tell you where there was a crock of gold.

Supposed to be gold buried here in Ireland at all these forths.

They’re on the top of every hill.

They were supposed to be made at the invasion of the Danes.

The Danes invaded Ireland, you see—away back—well, a thousand years ago. I can’t give you the particular date.

And these are fortifications built.

The Danes are the first stranger invaded Ireland—used to come in canoes, and it was for plunder they came, the Danish people.

And the Irish had to
all
collect,
on
the hilltops, and build these fortifications round, round as an
O
, or as round as that ovenlid there. And all get inside of it and they were all on the watch out.

I was here on this hillside in my fortifications, and if they saw the Danes coming, they’d blow their bugles, and it passed on from one to the other, from one end of Ireland to another, whenever the Danes invaded.

So there was a king. He was Brian Boru. He raged war against them, and ’twas ten hundred and fourteen, that’s the date he banished the last of the Danes. In ten hundred and fourteen, at Clontarf, here in the south of Ireland. And that ended them. So.

And there’s supposed to be money buried at these forths, and that’s where the fairies are supposed to
be
.

There was witch
craft
in Ireland
too
, in them days.

And these witches were supposed to say to the people, “
If
you shoot me, I’ll watch this crock of gold till the Day of Judgment, till the end of time.”

And they’re supposed to be watching, and the Good People knows where these crocks of gold is, and if you could catch one of these fairies—some calls them leprechauns, that’s another name—well, they’d tell you where the crock of gold was.

But.

A man made a great effort up here to catch one of them. He walked out of this clump of bushes, and he spoke up to him, and he told him that he was going to tell him where the crock of gold was.

He wanted to do him a favor,

   but the man couldn’t understand him,

      so he made a grab at the fairy.

And the fairy just leaped up above him, and lit just on a branch.